Bleed
by TheAllPowerfulOz
Summary: AU… Maybe. The Bleeding Effect is killing him, in more ways than one. Mentions of Yaoi. Rating may change as the story progresses.
1. Chapter 1

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_Written after a plotbunny bit me in the face the other day while I was talking to a friend, I may expand on it if the plotbunny returns for some more… *sprinkles self with seasoning*_

_Here's hoping._

_For those of you waiting for a new chapter to Fast Cars and a beginning to the Des Shaun fic I promised, give me a few more days I've gotten some written and am waiting for hubby dearest to finish proof reading it for me. I haven't abandoned anything. I swear it!_

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**YAOI WARNING!**

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**Chapter 1; Disclosure**

He didn't tell them at first because he didn't want to hinder the progress.

He could ignore the misty figures that swam in his line of sight. The people that strode with purpose down streets long forgotten.

Getting as much done as quickly as possible was the only thing that mattered.

The first time he blacked out he kept it to himself. Telling himself that it was a fluke, he'd been tired anyway, it could be overlooked.

The second time, he came out of it standing in the kitchen in his underwear holding a knife and staring at a deep bloody groove on his left ring finger.

He told Lucy he'd been cutting a carrot because he'd woken up hungry and slipped…

He didn't tell them when he started to look at what Shaun had written in the database, scrubbing his eyes because the words typed there looked alien, like a foreign language.

When at breakfast one morning he flinched, realizing the reason everybody had been staring at him in horror was that he'd been speaking in Italian for the last ten minutes, he just grinned deviously, cleared his throat and said; "Pretty cool, huh!" Pretending he'd been doing it on purpose.

That was the day, watching as they visibly relaxed, releasing sighs and telling him he was a jerk that Desmond realized he couldn't tell them because he didn't want them to know he'd lied and been keeping it secret for so long.

It went on like that for weeks. Slowly losing bits and pieces of himself to this… Bleeding.

He thought it was a fitting term, Bleeding… That's what it felt like, felt like his ancestors were bleeding into him, like when one of Shaun's red wool socks had gone into the wash accidentally with one of his white shirts… The color had bled into the shirt like Altair and Ezio were bleeding into Desmond. He chuckled hopelessly one day at breakfast and asked Rebecca if she knew where he could find some brain bleach. She laughed and told him he was funny… He felt a little hurt that she'd thought he'd been joking.

It was hard to remember who he was. Hard to remember if he even really existed or not. Or if he himself were just another ancestor bleeding into some poor dope in an even worse condition that himself.

It made him wonder if the poor dope knew how things turned out, knew if Desmond lived through it all and was finally able to be left alone and mix cocktails where nobody would bother him for anything more than a refill…

He supposed that if the poor bastard were having him as that preverbal red sock in his mental laundry things wouldn't turn out well.

He wondered what the guy was going through, having a bleed of a guy having a bleed.

Well, he guessed some good would come out of it, if he was just some poor guy's bleed that meant he'd be getting laid between now and the time he died… And if that was the case, if what they said about the Animus was true he wouldn't die, this awareness would slip to his son or daughter while he was getting laid and it would all start over again…

He stopped eating, didn't feel hungry anymore, and it seemed the days passed by with unsettling speed. Whole chunks, whole hours simply missing.

He started feeling itching in his veins, and began biting his nails until they bled. He didn't trust himself with a razor any longer, not with Lucy and Rebecca giving him such worried looks from the corners of their eyes, so he stopped shaving, began sitting under icy showers, or scalding hot showers just to feel something, to remind himself that this was his reality, even if he was just some blip in the Animus after all… He started talking to this hypothetical descendant that might be watching his life, asking how their day was, imagining an answer, lying awake at night with a pillow hugged to his chest whispering that everything would be OK in the end. Voicing his own fears and insecurities and trying to think of comforting things to say that may ease whatever this descendent of his might be going through. He started thinking outside his head, wondering what year it really was, who was watching his life, how many people had come after him. Who was currently looking through the back of his eyes… He started hiding his thoughts, refusing to remember things he didn't want anyone to know, pushing them back like boxes on a shelf. Piling more in front and shoving them to the rear, farther and farther until they hit the ledge and toppled off into oblivion and he was left pulling at his hair and fighting tears because he couldn't remember his mother's face anymore. Couldn't remember the taste of certain drinks and food he'd been very fond of. Couldn't remember the name of his last girlfriend, couldn't remember what it felt like to make love… He found himself closing his eyes when he went to the toilet lest said descendant some far away time in the future, be a girl.

It was all easier to accept when he thought of things away from his life. Easier to just let himself go and stop worrying about the fact he'd sat down to read entries in the database that morning at ten, and the whole day had just… blinked away without his notice.

It was easier to keep going if he convinced himself nothing was real and it was all just a relay and when his eyes really did open he would be himself again, and not some stranger in his blood who'd been dead for centuries.

It was so much easier that way…

Two days after the incident with the database, while in another icy shower, his whole left side went numb, and a pain sliced through his head, blinding him.

He was sure the Animus had just kicked him out, and when his eyes opened he'd be himself again. Himself that he didn't remember, someone new who was not Altair or Ezio or Desmond. He'd have that fresh start, those all too brief moments of blissful ignorance—

He woke up the next day lying in his bed, Rebecca and Shaun pressed close to him, staring with wide worried eyes.

He couldn't lie to them about it. Not entirely anyway… so he decided he'd start small. He told them he'd seen a ghostly Templar charge through the shower wall at him and he'd tripped in surprise.

Rebecca looked relieved, but still worried, and forbade him from going into the Animus for a week. "Your mind is taxed, you need to rest."

He stayed in bed all the rest of that day, hugging a pillow and staring into nothing, having one sided conversations with whoever was watching him.

Lucy walked over, her face solemn and concerned, rubbing his back until he looked at her and presenting a cup of milk. "Drink this…"

He refused at first, simply because he didn't like milk really… Not since Altair had bled into him so much that is.

"I'm not leaving until you drink this."

So he had, grumbling in Arabic and staring at her through Altair's expressions.

She just smiled sadly and patted his head when he flopped back onto his face.

Thirty seconds after she'd left he knew for certain that she'd just either poisoned or drugged him, and was tempted to run toward the bathroom and shove fingers down his throat to get rid of it, but that niggling thought returned.

_I'm still here… I'm not getting out of here until he knocks someone up… so even if she did poison me I'm not gonna die._

Twenty minutes later he was fast asleep… He had no nightmares. He didn't even dream. Just deep, black and silent REST.

He woke three days later and things were different.

Shaun didn't snap at him, didn't make rude comments. He seemed surprisingly distracted and didn't speak at all.

Lucy and Rebecca acted almost normally, concerned silent glances from the edges of their eyes…

But Shaun… Shaun watched him. His snapping, scathing remarks were almost completely absent. One slipping halfway out every so often, but most of the time, he just… just stared.

It was unnerving.

Days turned into weeks… His skills became razor like in their precision even as his mental state continued to corrode. Time becoming something abstract, there was only one day, one perpetual day he lived in. They moved safe houses once, twice, three times, and Desmond found himself in a drafty old house just outside of Italy, freezing in a mid-winter snowstorm.

Everyone was worn, and despite the fact Lucy gave him that drugged milk every so often to make him sleep he felt constantly exhausted. As if his mind wouldn't shut up. And even the dreamless blackness between wakings was hellish, his mind roaring and screaming and bouncing off the walls like a tethered, frightened cat.

And then Desmond became aware of a change, growing progressively worse with each waking.

Shaun was sick. He kept telling everyone it was only a cold, but Desmond had heard him coughing and somehow he knew better.

It wasn't until he was standing in the doorway to the room he had been sharing with the Brit, watching Lucy mop the sweat off his forehead with a wet rag that the nagging unfamiliar tension that had resided at the back of his mind since Shaun had started being civil to him, truly became worrying.

And then time skipped again, this time though, it was not seamless. It was not simply sitting down at the database screen and staring at it then realizing six hours have passed, or laying down after drinking that godawful milk and waking up a week later and nobody noticing anything. No… One second he was standing there thinking that Shaun needed medicine, needed a doctor, watching the water drip off Lucy's fingers as she wrung out the cloth for another pass— and everything had gone black like it did between wakings.

For a moment he thought, happily enough that he'd lost sync in the Animus and he was FINALLY going to get to wake up, but when the loading screen didn't appear after a long while of writhing in the darkness he decided maybe he'd just died, or perhaps he'd passed out because his knees had been locked… The next moment, like pages missing from a book, he was walking down the hall toward the Brit's room and Rebecca was shouting at him;

_"WHERE_ HAVE YOU _BEEN!"_

His limbs were heavy, half frozen, and snow was caked on his boots.

Boots? He'd been wearing tennis shoes seconds before. And what did he have in his hand?

Curiously, he stopped dead in his tracks and lifted his arm, gloved fingers uncurling, staring in wonder at the vial of penicillin in his palm.

Where had he gotten that?

_Don't worry about it. Get the medicine to Shaun._

And he shuddered, taking off again, shrugging Rebecca away as he pushed into the room.

Lucy was there, and Shaun looked terrible. He was pale, too still, naked looking without his glasses, wearing nothing but a sweat stained white t-shirt and a pair of dark blue boxer-briefs, lying in an awkward looking position between thin, twisted sheets.

He stood there by the bed and watched hawk like as Lucy gave him the medicine, wincing as she plunged the syringe into his arm— Then Rebecca's fingers tangled in his coat and yanked him backward out of the room, slammed him bodily against the wall and leveled a finger in his face.

"You do NOT just disappear like that! I don't care _who_ you think you are! You do NOT _EVER_ DO THAT! You risked our position. You risked your _life!_ All the work we've done! You are too valuable! Shaun knew what he was getting into, we _all_ do! We are here to help and protect YOU! WE are expendable! YOU ARE NOT! Don't you DARE do that again!"

It was the first time Rebecca had ever really yelled at him, but somehow it felt familiar and his hands came up as if on their own framing her face, his body quickly going numb as their mouths pressed together, and suddenly it was dark. Everything was still.

He woke lying in his bed, and he didn't feel at home in his skin…

He climbed slowly to his feet and shuffled to the adjoining bathroom, clicking on the light and blinking stupidly at himself.

He stared into his own face for a long while in silence, unmoving, as if expecting his reflection to move off on its own.

He leaned close and stared into his own eyes, pulled at his eyelids, opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue, checked his teeth and scratched his nails through his hair.

There was something wrong… He didn't know what it was, but there was something wrong. He looked in the mirror again and he didn't feel connected to what he saw, to what he felt as he stepped back and slid down the wall to hug his knees.

And then he felt his lips moving, heard himself whispering, only it wasn't comforting words to his descendant. The voice that came from his throat was familiar, sounded like his own, but at the same time did not—

"I am sorry…"

He was startled, terrified even, and he quickly climbed to his feet, legs shaking and feeling oddly like stilts. He stumbled out of the bathroom and collapsed onto his bed.

Across the room Shaun's bed was empty, and fear ripped through his middle.

Where was Shaun?

A soft knocking sound on the door and the click of the lock sliding back made his breath seize in his throat.

"Desmond?"

Lucy stepped slowly into the room, her face blank.

"Where's Shaun?"

It felt like he was watching a movie or something, nothing around him felt exactly real.

Lucy took a deep breath and let it out slowly, eyes watchful. "He's sleeping in the other room."

He swallowed hard, a strange alien fear curdling his insides. He wanted to run away from her… But why?

And why did Lucy have a stun gun on her hip?

His voice shook as he spoke, terror making his eyes water; "What's happening?"

"Nothing is happening, Des."

"You h-had the door locked… Why did you have me locked in here?"

Her hands lifted slowly, "Just relax."

"Is Shaun OK?"

"He's still asleep, but he's doing a lot better."

He swallowed thickly, feeling oddly hollow, pinching himself just to feel the sting, to reassure himself his skin was his own, despite what his mind kept telling him. He almost laughed when he spoke, simply because he was afraid and hoped laughing would make it sound absurd; "A-am I OK?"

Lucy's face remained impassive, but her eyes changed… Darkening sadly. "No, Des… You're not OK."

His vision started darkening at the edges. Little flashes of memory. And his body went suddenly numb, lips moving without his control, voice alien sounding rolling strange syllables across his tongue;

"You must leave now…"

Lucy's eyes overflowed and her hands dropped to her sides. She gave a single nod and left quickly, and as the door closed, locking with an audible click, Desmond found himself in that hellish, dark dreamlessness.

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When Desmond woke again it was daylight and he wasn't alone in the room… He was sitting cross legged on his bed, and across from him, seated on Shaun's bed, were his three teammates.

Time had passed, he didn't know how much, but it must have been days because Shaun's face was covered in more sharp auburn fuzz than he remembered and the dark circles under his eyes looked more gray than purple.

Shaun was also wrapped in a blanket, looking somehow detached but professional even though it was obvious he'd been very, very ill only a short time ago.

Desmond was aware of being entirely immobile, while at the same time, he was also aware of something else. Something horrifying, life altering even… He could feel two people on either side of him. Not physically, but he was aware of them. Close to his sides… _Within_ him.

One of the two, the one to his left was suddenly moving, writhing under his skin like a wild beast.

He panicked. This sense of wrong, of not belonging, being split washed over him and he gave a loud shout of horror—

Everything went dark again, alone, and the panic built higher. A moment later the world faded back into focus, and he could only feel one person with him. Someone calm, someone who had him pulled close like a hug while his heart hammered wildly in his chest and his skin tingled.

He wanted to shrink into the embrace, as well as push away and scream at them to get out! To get out of his body and leave him alone! This was wrong, whoever, or whatever was there did not belong!

And then the presence spoke.

"Tell him."

Lucy flinched, eyes suddenly pained. "Desmond?"

He tried frantically to speak, to react, to do anything, but he remained still, like a little speck of thought floating in the abyss.

"He is here, tell him."

Somewhere behind him, far away, maybe in another room Desmond could feel that third person, a sick frightened speck of energy like himself bouncing around like a ball in a dryer.

Lucy's face screwed up angrily; "I want to talk to HIM! What right do you have to stay in control like this! It's not your—"

"You know what could happen if I do not…"

Lucy's teeth clicked together and for a long few minutes she was silent, face reddening from withheld anger, fists shaking, shoulders square— And then, with a hitched sob she started talking, folding in on herself in guilt.

"Abstergo, the Templars— They didn't want you Des… They didn't want _information_ on Altair, or Ezio… They wanted Altair and Ezio." She swallowed and forced herself to continue; "They were trying to use you like a magnet, draw out their memories from your DNA and d-download it onto data disks… Then upload it into—" She shook her head, hands lifting to cover her face; "I can't… I c—"

And Shaun's hand snaked out of the blankets and rested on her knee. He took a deep breath to gather himself, looked right into Desmond's eyes and spoke three words he had not been expecting at all.

"You're a clone."

Desmond wanted to laugh, and had he been anything other than an abstract thought at the moment he would have. Hysterically. Would have doubled over holding his sides and gasping for breath. He had to be dreaming. A nightmare, a hallucination. ANYTHING would be better than this!

Shaun continued slowly, Lucy turning to bury her head in his shoulder.

"The Templars had been trying to perfect it… Get what they were after without the person going completely insane… W-without the ancestor's memories becoming integrated with the Subject's." He looked away then, into the corner; "When they found Desmond he was the last living descendent. He went mad within two months and k-killed himself." He cleared his throat; "They tried to just plainly clone him, hoping that what had happened to him wouldn't have imprinted on his DNA, but it didn't work exactly right. They got a perfect genetic replica, but there was no voluntary brain function, so they tried again, and again. With the same result."

Desmond wanted to scream, but he couldn't. All he seemed capable of was writhing, fighting against whoever was in control of his body. But whoever it was, was too strong and all he ended up doing was exhausting himself.

"Then someone got the bright idea to try and download some of his memories into one of them… And it worked, for the most part… some of the memories were corrupted… But they had you, a fresh start, and they had two more backups incase you failed too."

Lucy's voice sounded strained and wet as she turned from Shaun; "But it didn't fail this time… Somehow they didn't bleed into you. W-we thought for a while that they had, I was afraid we'd lose you, but—" She turned and looked right into his eyes. "But you're still there… You're still there and if Shaun hadn't gotten sick we would have had more time before you found out, we would have had time to ease you into it, would have been able to do something about it. They were being cooperative." She wiped her eyes; "Des, I know this is scary, but you have to stay calm, we can't lose you. Shaun, Becca and I have been trying to find a way to fix it, to separate the three of you, because having them both in there too is hurting you, mentally and physically…" She pushed her hair behind her ear; "The Templars were trying to make perfect soldiers, mindless drones with Assassin training, but they can't do that without you… And we have the data disk with all the information on it they need. We just need to figure out how they were planning to separate you once they'd achieved this. How they download the memories into—Into their blanks. If we can do that, we'll have them by the balls." She shifted forward to kneel before him in the floor, gripping his hands. "You just have to hang in there and understand what has happened, that it isn't going to be permanent… We'll get them out and you'll be OK again. Just please, please try to stay calm." Then her gaze seemed to shift, taking in all of him. "We are here for all of you. We're going to fix this… Just hang in there."

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	2. Chapter 2

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**Chapter 2; Humanity**

Suddenly he could feel the right side of his body. It was a light feeling, and he could barely twitch his hand, but he could move a little bit…

And the first thing he tried to do was launch himself off the bed and run for the door. He wasn't a clone. He couldn't be. He remembered at that moment, in perfect clarity, his childhood, the Farm, his parents. Remembered the first time he'd gotten drunk, the first time he'd had sex. He had scars from training and fights—He looked down at his hands, intent on proving it to her. He had a scar on the fleshy part of his thumb from slicing lemons at the bar. He remembered how much it had stung—

But when he forced his hand over and stared at the spot, there was no mark.

He pressed his fingers to his lips, feeling the ridge of scar tissue there, mouth opening to tell Lucy how he'd gotten it, but his voice just came out in urgent little wheezes.

It couldn't be true. He could not be a clone! He wasn't!

But then something frightening came to the surface of his mind and his stomach heaved.

How could Subject Sixteen have corrupted his files? The Animus read genetic material. The only way he could have corrupted those files was if they'd had the same DNA. The only way he could have done it was following the linear progression of genetics from parent to child… Or in this case, original to clone.

Three little words rang in his head and Desmond felt himself slipping back into the darkness of his mind, felt this strange controlling entity trying to lock him away in a closet in his mind.

He fought, willed himself to stay on the surface, willed himself not to fall backward into the dark where whoever was in control of his body may never let him out again. He didn't want to go back there, not with that wild flurry of anger, fear and sadness writhing about so near to him.

His mind felt too full, crushed, and he tried, putting as much energy as he had access to into pushing the two strangers back and taking control of himself again. He wanted to push them out, open his veins and watch them flow away.

His voice shook, almost in tears, slurred from his lack of strength; "Lucy…"

The blonde grabbed at him, pulling him close, one hand on either side of his face; "Des, please, just relax, it'll be OK. I promise, it'll be OK! We just have to find out how they were planning on doing it and we'll fix it!"

"I don't want to disappear… Don't let me disappear."

And the darkness swallowed him up.

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It wasn't as hard to live with as he'd thought it was. Of course, he supposed he was still in a good bit of shock. And the whole being a clone thing? Well he just flatly refused to accept that and had pushed the thought from his mind.

The only bad thing about it though was that when he woke up, someone else had already been awake, someone who was sitting on his bed eating strawberry flavored instant oatmeal and talking calmly with Rebecca.

The person, whoever it was, went very tense and the instant Desmond recoiled from the foreign, unwanted presence in his head and body, They recoiled a little as well.

The overall effect was somewhat painful, like he'd just been clubbed atop the head with a crowbar. His hands tightened on the spoon and bowl and his body rocked backward, head thudding sharply against the headboard.

Rebecca made a shocked, startled noise and grabbed at him, hands lacing at the back of his head thinking he was about to start seizing. The resulting little fight for dominance must have looked like a seizure, Desmond decided. When The Other recoiled he tried to push to the front, only to have The Other push forward at the same time.

The pressure was exquisite. Desmond had had intense bleeds before, sudden lightening strikes of moments where he was simply no longer Desmond, but was someone else, somewhen else and his body acted accordingly, walking—or trying to walk around people and places that had long sense fallen to ruin and dust.

But what happened the moment the two of them tried to push forward at the same time was something else entirely.

Desmond was aware of himself, his own memories… and he was also suddenly aware of Ezio's memories. As if they overlapped, and his consciousness screamed that he couldn't have been two people at once… and began forcing the memories together at spectacular speed. Stronger memories snuffing out weaker ones, everything latticing together into something indistinguishable from either his own, or Ezio's experience.

He was sure, in that moment, that his head had been cleaved neatly in two and his brain was exposed to the air. The plop of oatmeal into his lap only solidified that, as well as Rebecca screaming over her shoulder for help.

The chaos could only have lasted a few seconds, but it was long enough to be hellish, and the next second a third entity was there in his head, had grabbed the two of them, like the two sides of a towel—and **_ripped_** them apart.

Everything went gray for a few moments, hot and cold all at once, and when Desmond opened his eyes he was laying in the floor on his back and his three teammates were bending over him, Rebecca holding a magazine of some kind fanning his face with it, Lucy had both hands firmly on his shoulders and Shaun was taking his pulse.

"That's it… That's it, calm down." Lucy was saying in a shaky, worn voice.

He tried to speak, but his mouth wouldn't move, his tongue felt loose and swollen and a little numb.

He was shivering, violently, and felt utterly and completely raped in some way. Used and abused and not really alive.

He hated it, and as he was helped by Shaun and Lucy to the bathroom, instead of sitting on the edge of the tub and letting the blonde drape a cool wet hand towel over the back of his neck, he dropped to his knees and barely had time to shove the toilet seat up before he was retching.

Lucy didn't try to lock him away in his room for the rest of the day, and he sat on the couch hugging his knees without saying a word, staring at the far wall. He couldn't get that feeling out of his head, out of his skin. That feeling of being made of something viscous and sticky. Of becoming so intimately entwined with Ezio, being able to see and feel everything the other felt, the revulsion and horror and fear because Ezio had been able to feel and see him as well. Ezio KNEW, and hated him for it.

Two or three times Desmond became aware of that third presence, the silent one, creeping up in his mind, calm and open feeling, melting his emotions a little to offer some strange form of comfort, but Desmond physically flinched and bared his teeth, glancing to his right where he associated this third person to be, and they retreated again into the depths of his mind, like brushing up against the bell shaped top of a jellyfish while swimming and not getting stung.

Shaun came into the room a while later, it could have been minutes, it could have been hours. He was dressed in slacks and thick socks and a dark green hooded sweatshirt Desmond had never seen before. His face was pale but the circles under his eyes were diminished and though his voice was rough, it had regained some of its strength.

"Feeling alright, Des?"

He only flinched in response and leaned fractionally to the side away from the Brit.

Shaun nodded, he hadn't expected an answer anyway. "Right, well… 'thought I'd give you a bit of company is all." He rubbed his hands on his knees and was quiet for a while, staring at his feet, focus in his peripheral vision on Desmond's hands. "I…" He paused, wetted his lips, swallowed and tried again; "I wasn't able to thank you for getting that medicine… So—" He cleared his throat; "Consider yourself thanked I guess."

Desmond just watched him, confusion like a sour taste in the back of his throat.

"It really was a stupid thing though… You shouldn't have left like that. You could have been killed, then where would we be." It wasn't a question.

After a minute of silence, maybe it was longer, Desmond couldn't really tell truthfully, Shaun's left arm lifted and found the tense knot of muscles between the younger man's shoulders, rubbing gently.

For a few seconds Desmond remained stiff, just staring at him, nose wrinkled because he wanted to shout that he wasn't weak, wasn't some woman that needed to be saved or coddled and what did Shaun care anyway what he was feeling? What did anybody care? All they wanted was the same thing the Templars wanted and they didn't give a DAMN about him! They were willing to put him, mentally, physically and spiritually on the chopping block for just a chance at getting what they wanted out of him! They'd killed him once over it, why couldn't they have just... just— but even while he was preparing himself to say it his eyes began to burn and his throat constricted.

If all his memories were just copies from someone else, if everything he'd experienced had happened to another, did that mean he'd never felt sadness before? Did it mean that, aside from the times he'd taken it for granted when Lucy hugged him when he was tired, he'd never been comforted by another human being before? Did that mean he was even real? Or just a pale reflection? Just a copy of someone who once was...

He felt cold, alone and _inhuman. _He wanted to scratch at his inner arms until he bled, wanted to peel back this too solid flesh and let himself evaporate, because nothingness couldn't hurt as badly as this bullshit...

If he really was a clone did that mean he'd never been born? Never been a child? That he'd never really been hugged by his mother, or patted on his head by his father? That everything he clung to and prayed his memories of weren't hallucinations, was in fact all a lie?

Did that mean he wasn't human?

He knew for a fact that if he really were a clone that he'd never cried before, because when he choked, turning his head away so he didn't have to look at Shaun, lifting his hands to push weakly at the other man trying to get away, a preverbal tidal wave crashed over him and he was sobbing. Something soundless and heartbroken and hopeless because in that moment he wasn't anybody, wasn't Altair, or Ezio or Desmond, he was just someone who was hurting and lost and alone in the world.

Shaun's hand tangled in his hood and pulled and the Brit's little beard scratched at his forehead, his pulse steady where Desmond's fingers tangled in his shirtfront, knuckles pressed uncomfortably into his throat in his desperation to get closer, to feel some kind of warmth something that he knew wasn't a lie and could truly call his own. "I hate you..." He choked, coughed, sobbed, choked again and managed to find his voice; "A-all of you... I h-hate all of you."

Shaun didn't say anything, he supposed it was because all he could think of was just a defense mechanism, something sarcastic and almost rude because he didn't know how to handle this, didn't know how to deal with the fact Desmond was curled into a ball between his arms and was nothing but a wreck of confusion and grief. So, he just ground his teeth and stayed quiet.

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Desmond didn't sleep. He refused the drugged milk Lucy brought to him, just continued to cling with inhuman strength to Shaun's sweatshirt, eyes open but unseeing.

Lucy was afraid, worried that they'd done the wrong thing in telling him, that they'd really broken him and now they were all doomed. The Bleeding Effect had almost killed him to begin with, now it was killing him in a completely new and horrifying way.

Shaun managed to somehow get him to his feet and lead him to bed, then with a put upon sigh peeled his sweatshirt off because he couldn't pry the other's fingers from it and sat on the edge of the bed with him, hand rubbing firm, but gentle circles on his back. He stayed until his eyes wouldn't stay open any longer and Rebecca came and forced him to leave.

Desmond didn't speak or eat or really move for three days.

Shaun supposed that he'd had to have gotten up a few times to go to the bathroom because the bedroom didn't smell and his usual white hoodie was gone, replaced by Shaun's green one and the younger man looked lost in it. But nobody saw him move so much as an inch.

The forth day Shaun brought in a mug of tea and a sandwich, sat both on the bedside table and yanked the blankets back, feeling a little mean inside because Desmond flinched, bare feet looking somehow small and helpless where they curled and his knees tucked closer to his chin.

He didn't have to say anything to Desmond, just stood there with his hands on hips staring, and as if the brunette was able to able to read the Brit's mind he sighed weightily and sat up, legs crossed, limbs creaking and popping and stiff looking, arms wound around him.

He ate slowly, his expression blank as if he tasted nothing, as if he were merely going through the motions and there was nothing but cotton between his ears.

The tea though, the tea did something different.

Desmond took the cup between both hands as Shaun held it out to him and took a small sip of it— His brows twitched and half a breath later he was gulping it down.

Shaun wanted to scowl and tell him to slow it up, that the tea had been hot and the last thing he needed was a scalded throat, but there was something different about his expression. Something that was Desmond, but at the same time… not.

Shaun was reminded of an internet viral video he'd seen once of a cat licking at a saucer of cream. Another cat had come up to it, mewed questioningly, and the first cat, though wary, had allowed it to share.

And that's when it hit him… Shaun wasn't looking at just Desmond anymore, and it was somehow frightening in the same instant it was exciting beyond compare. He cleared his throat quietly and spoke in a hushed voice as he might do to a wild animal that was slowly becoming acclimated to his presence. "W-who else am I speaking to at the moment?"

Two gold eyes flicked up to his face, the left was a little wary, and the right was calm, tired. It was like there was a division right down the center of Desmond's body, one half for each of them.

The cup lowered a fraction, and the voice that answered was just a whisper, heavily accented and familiar and excitement shot up from Shaun's toes into his chest;

"Altair."

The cup lifted again and both eyes glazed over slightly in relieved contentment at the taste.

Shaun had a million questions, a billion maybe. But he held them back because the left side of Desmond's body, the Desmond half of it was still a little tense, his hand shaking and unsteady, eye leery but tolerant… for the moment.

Shaun knew the expression on that half of his face. Desmond was waiting, ready to spring and fight, but from what Shaun could decipher from the right side of his face, the Altair half, there was no contest, no threat. Altair was being calm, respectful it seemed, almost submissive to Desmond's authority over the body they shared.

Shaun knew instantly that it was a protective kind of submission. Altair was keeping himself small and unthreatening so Desmond didn't become upset, didn't lash out and cause harm to himself. Altair was doing it to keep Desmond calm, safe and healthy, unlike Ezio had. Ezio had thrust his dominance forward and tried to crush Desmond out, tried to stamp him out like a cigarette butt and take complete control because he was frightened and felt violated by not being alone in 'his' body.

It seemed to be working, because the longer Altair was calm, letting Desmond feel in control of the situation the calmer Desmond became, the more at ease he was with the other's presence at the forefront of his mind. The less terrified he was of being crushed out of existence.

It was somehow ballet like, how carefully the two halves moved. How the Altair half was just a bare fraction of a second behind the Desmond half, mirroring his actions so the cup didn't spill.

"This is so weird," Desmond's voice was a little louder, his eyes almost crossing as he tried to peer over the bridge of his nose as if he could look into his other eye and see Altair.

The Altair half of him grinned and when his mouth opened a second time Altair's voice came out; "It is not difficult though, is it?"

He seemed to think a moment and his words came out as a whisper; "No… J-just weird."

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It became evident quickly to Desmond why he'd been so fucking tired for so long. The two other men in his head hadn't been letting his body sleep, and that blank dreamlessness was not restful at all, it was nerve wracking, hellish. His body got no sleep between the constant rotation of three men at its helm, even if he did give in and drink that disgusting drugged milk Lucy presented to him. And none of them slept because there was nothing soothing, or calm about being trapped in your head, especially for them. Assassins training and lifestyle, alertness was the center of everything. Even when asleep an assassin was alert. But that blackness… The rear closets of Desmond's mind, was like being sealed in a coffin hundreds of miles beneath the earth's surface. There was only you and the crushingly small space you were confined to.

Being without sleep was slowly, and inexorably killing Desmond. He knew Altair and Ezio noticed it, knew Lucy, Rebecca and probably even Shaun most likely knew as well, but he tried to hide it anyway, because common decency dictated that you just didn't talk about such things if you wanted to retain your macho exterior.

Certain foods, Desmond also started to notice, made him sick. He tried to hide that particularly because it was kind of embarrassing to realize he'd used an entire role of toilet paper in one day. His muscles, joints, his very bones ached savagely. His face was puffy and swollen, his eyes bloodshot and unable to focus. He was cranky, irritable, nauseous, angry… He'd lost weight, there were uncomfortable dry itchy places on his skin… and his hair had begun to fall out from the stress. He could scrape his hands through it and pull out fistfuls it seemed.

"I've seen a thousand years worth of my ancestry and I'm gonna be the first one to go bald…" He growled at his reflection in the mirror, pulling more and more hair out because his very nerves sang that sooner or later it would all be gone and no more would fall out and cling to his shirts.

Days passed, he didn't know how many. Time meant nothing to him anymore because it was no longer constant. It stopped and started as sporadically and strangely as if he'd just cut whole days out of existence.

Oddly enough, it reminded him of having a really bad hangover. Waking up only to find you had absolutely no memories of the night before, what you'd done or what you'd had done to you.

Shaun made him eat. Sometimes going so far as to threaten to make airplane noises if he had to bloody well sit down and feed him.

Desmond found that if he ignored it long enough on most occassions, his mind would skip ahead and he wouldn't be hungry anymore. On others... He had to hold his breath and choke it down, praying he didn't throw it up again later.

Lucy and Rebecca always seemed to be in motion when he was awake. Bent over computer screens or standing at the far end of the room talking on cell phones. They kept referring to 'The Blanks', that they needed information on where to find them. What kind of things they had to expect when they _did_ find them. He tried to avoid them at all costs. Staying sequestered in the room he shared with Shaun, huddled under the blankets with just his face showing, watching the Brit while he typed or rested, or drank tea while he read.

And then, when Desmond had been shuffling silently past the room, hoping not to be noticed on his way to the storage closet to pilfer another roll of two-ply, he'd overheard Lucy ask the someone she'd been talking to about _The Rose,_ and suddenly Desmond became acutely aware of the duel presences of his uninvited guests. They were pressed close to the forefront of his mind, listening through his ears.

He was reminded of a Three Stooges film, peeking around the door jamb with their heads stacked one on top of the other. He felt his lips moving, whispering back and forth in Latin, and he was stuck in the middle of it, shocked because he himself didn't really speak that much Latin, which was odd because he could remember a time, before this had all become so dire, that he'd been able to understand it quite well.

_Maybe,_ he thought, _Maybe the Bleeding Effect can go both ways… It can bleed into you, but it can bleed out again too. _

He laughed to himself, a little relieved, a little hopeful, and didn't realize anything was amiss until he heard Altair using his voice to call to him and he had the mental sensation of the blip that was Altair shaking the blip that was him like a dog would do a towel.

"Desmond… Your lack of focus is appalling. Move or she will see!"

He cleared his throat, his senses muted and sluggish, and he could feel the sensation of amusement coming from the left side of his mind, where Ezio was floating around.

Lucy was moving, having ended her call, and her shoes were clicking against the floor, approaching him quickly.

Desmond remembered seeing movies and television shows where characters would huddle together to eavesdrop and when the person they'd been covertly listening to started toward them there was a brief scuffle and a parting of ways. He'd always thought seeing people do it was hilarious… The mental sensation of it though, was something different because Altair took control of the right side of his body without preamble, sensing that Desmond's reflexes had been muddled and slow… Right at the same time Ezio had decided to take control all together.

It was almost, as if he could picture himself, and his two guests as those large rubber balls you see in the supermarket, all three hurdling toward the same point at fantastic speed, just to collide and bounce off into the ether.

He felt his eyes part, tilting outward in opposite directions, his arms spread and his knees bent… To an outsider it appeared he was preparing to do a perfect swan dive nose first into the hallway floor, what Lucy saw reminded her of antique images of samurai, their eyes wild and dark, like marbles protruding from their frowning fierce faces. She herself thought Desmond looked like he was in the middle of some complex yoga pose, so when he froze, his eyes going very dim and just tipped backward onto the floor she was stunned for all of two seconds, then terrified… Then amused when Desmond started groaning and rubbing his face muttering and slurring and cursing.

"Oooooh, _ooooowwww_… fuckfuckfuck… Don't do that again guys… _owowow." _He lifted his left foot and stomped three times, ala Mr. Ed, and writhed a little in misery.

Lucy crouched beside him and tilted her head. "Are you OK?"

He kept rubbing his eyes but nodded. "Felt like a mental kick to the nuts… _hnnnnnng."_

She winced in sympathy and said the last thing he expected her to. "Well, good news is, you only have to put up with them for a few more days."

He went still, and lifted his hands away from watering bloodshot eyes; "Huh?"

"We know how to separate you."

"Separate how?"

She glanced down at the phone in her hands, then back into his face, slightly unnerved, because she knew, simply from the glazed, overtaxed expression on his face that Altair and Ezio were listening as well. "As in separate them into their own bodies."

Ezio pushed forward frantically, thrashing and clawing and fighting, but Altair had hold of him, pulling him back a little where he wouldn't be able to interfere.

Desmond levered himself up, getting close to Lucy so his strained eyes could focus on her. "Their own bodies… How."

She swallowed and shifted backward a little. "I told you already that the Templars tried more than once to clone D—Clone Him… They succeeded in that all three times, but there was no brain function. They—"

He looked pained so she cleared her throat and skipped ahead a little.

"There are two more still… The Blanks. If we can successfully separate the three of you, they'll each have their own body."

"And I can go home?" He bit his tongue the moment the words left his mouth… How stupid. He was a clone, he didn't have a home. He looked pointedly away, ashamed and disappointed.

Lucy let her breath out slowly, eyes tender.

He lifted his face again; "What has to be done? What do I— what do we do?"

She took a deep breath and let it out carefully, her nose wrinkled as she thought how best to word it. "We… We have to get all three of you into the loading screen of the Animus at once."

He swallowed thickly. "That sounds easy."

"Becca and I are afraid that all three of you might have to be completely aware at one time to do it… But it's extremely dangerous. Do you—" She paused, and started again. "The other day when you woke up while Ezio was talking to Becca—"

He remembered that alright. Remembered it had been agonizing, as if someone had hold of his very soul and were smashing in against—INTO some hateful stranger's. As if someone were just completely erasing him… As if he were disappearing.

He understood without another word being spoken. To have all three of them fully awake at once he risked everything. Not just his life, but everything he was. This wasn't something frightening, wasn't becoming someone else over time by the power of shared memories, it wasn't pale and dim shapes waltzing back and forth across his field of vision, wasn't suddenly desiring to grow a beard despite the fact that just a few weeks ago he'd not liked them. It wasn't craving food he'd never tasted. If he did this he risked everything in one fell swoop. Risked his very soul, everything that made him who he—who he hoped he was.

"And if it doesn't work? If we're all…" He curled his fingers like claws and made a circular motion in front of his face. "W-what then?"

She was quiet for a few seconds, but when she spoke she answered honestly. He would always remember that… She answered him honestly.

"I don't know."

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	3. Chapter 3

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**Chapter 3; The Tundra**

Desmond found himself pulled back into the fold after that, trusted again, now that he'd been able to convince Lucy that he and THEY could work together. That he wasn't any more dangerous than he had been before.

He thought it was a load of shit anyway, but he supposed he had to deal with it until this… 'Seperation' she had mentioned. He wouldn't have been in this mess if not for Lucy and the Assassins and Templars. He would have been happily mixing cocktails and learning to play guitar, or fixing his motorcycle or… or… He shuddered.

If it hadn't been for the assassins and the Templars and their shit, Desmond—the real, original Desmond, would still have been alive and doing all those things he did.

The real Desmond wouldn't have been driven insane, wouldn't have killed himself… And THIS wouldn't be happening…

But, did that mean that he wouldn't exist if this hadn't happened? Did that mean that he wasn't Desmond? That he was someone new? Or did that mean that he was Desmond, just in a new body?

He decided to stay as far away from Lucy and Rebecca as he could and tried not to think about it because thinking about it made his head hurt and made the OTHERS feel too close.

Lucy didn't let him do much of anything when he was allowed out of his cell. It was obvious just looking at him that he was beyond exhausted. But, he could read over information for errors, wincing because the whole time Ezio was pushing at him, practically clinging to his back like an angry chimp pounding him on the head with a skillet.

Ezio didn't much appreciate the fact people had been spying on him. Certain things, yes, he accepted that they had to be seen… But following him around in his head while he was looking for comfort in the arms of a woman? Or when he had to relieve himself? Or during those waning years of his life when he'd started to become ill more frequently, when he was always so completely bone tired, when the smallest abrasion and cut became sometimes so horridly infected a doctor would have to cut or sear it closed, when just the slightest dampness of the world at night when he was forced to sleep outside would give him a cough or chills and a fever that would last for days, perhaps even weeks, for no reason at all?

No, Ezio would have none of that. Those things were private, there was no point in anybody else seeing, or knowing about it!

"Rude!" He would shout through Desmond's mouth sometimes, forcing his eyes closed; "You're all so very VERY RUDE!"

And Desmond would lean back in his seat and rub at his brow tiredly and try to respond in a calm voice; "We didn't have a choice—" His left fist would curl in his own hair and he'd have to pry his fingers free and pin that hand beneath him to the chair then sit there for a while with a look on his face Shaun said was better suited someone trying to work through a tough bout of constipation, as he wrestled Ezio back to the rear of his mind, or let himself relax while Altair did it.

Lucy didn't know how he'd managed to not pass out yet. She dreaded when he did lose consciousness. Prayed that they were able to wake him up again… that nothing bad happened to him, or his two passengers. She didn't know what would happen when IT happened. When Desmond's body finally gave up and knocked him out. What would happen to the three consciousnesses in his mind? Would they all be forced to merge? Or would everything be OK when he woke up… Or would he simply not wake up at all?

She noticed a trend as well, a trend that didn't set well with her. DESMOND wouldn't eat, ALTAIR would if he was forced, but EZIO, on the other hand, would… with great relish.

He especially seemed to enjoy chocolate. Or, unfortunately for Shaun, Nutella. Shaun had walked in on him one early morning standing in the middle of the kitchen with the only jar of the stuff in the house, the only jar of nutty, tasty spready stuff Shaun wasn't allergic to, with a finger in it swiping the last delicious brown paste from an otherwise perfectly clean container.

"A jar…" Shaun had said, still in shock of it; "He ate a whole jar."

Ezio was also eerily quiet. He rarely spoke, unless it was to shout profanities at them, or to chat at Rebecca, and Lucy had a sneaking suspicion it was more because she reminded him of Rosa than any actual trust he had for her.

He would sit there, as far as he possibly could get from whoever had been appointed his guard at the time… And watch. Memorizing, learning… Calculating

Ezio… Was not at all who she had thought he was.

Everything their history said he did, everything it had said he was, his strength, his cunning, his power… was all there, that was for sure… But there was something else as well— And it was terrifying.

At first she'd been excited, thinking of him as a weapon against the Templars. Thinking of all three of them as weapons against their enemy. How awesome their combined power would be. The Assassins might actually have a chance to win this—

She'd never expected to find herself on the other end of Ezio's stares. Never expected for all that hate and knowledge, to be focused on her as if she were the bad guy.

Ezio, it turned out… Was scary.

And he held no inhibitions toward slowly sinking a knife into your throat, grinning the whole time.

He was a sneaky bastard too, that was for certain, and they found that out the hard way when he wrested control from Desmond shortly after Lucy had contacted one of her informants about how the Templars separated and downloaded memories into their Blanks, and had refused to back off for more than a week now.

Lucy was beginning to worry that he might not be able to back away now, that Altair and Ezio would be trapped back there for good and the whole Brotherhood would be damned because of him.

Worse than that, he'd tried multiple times now to escape. Only just being caught as he tried to slip out the door, or out the window wearing stolen clothes, sweatpants layered over jeans, one of Shaun's sweaters with one of Lucy's belts over it and a blanket tied around his shoulders like a cape.

It was almost comical to find him in such a state because he looked like a child playing dress up, but she constantly had to remind herself that in his mind, he was dressed to travel and travel quickly. She had to drug his food to make him sleep, and even then he remained aware, staring at everything going on around him with angry, dilated eyes, slurring vulgarities at every chance he got.

It was horrifying thinking how close they'd come to losing them simply because Ezio was that quiet when he was trying to escape. Every attempt that had been foiled so far always seemed to happen by luck alone. They'd realize he wasn't where they'd left him, and fan out frantically searching the house, and there he would be, up high, with his eyes keen and alert—

Watching…

After the forth time Lucy began to suspect that the 'escape attempts' weren't really escape attempts at all, and she'd begun watching him back.

Ezio was smart, and he knew that were smart as well… Perhaps he was trying to flatter them by letting them think they'd foiled his attempts when in all actuality he was fattening them up like pigs for slaughter? Making them complacent and biding his time for something different. Something big?

But what?

And then it had come to her…

They'd given Desmond a hidden blade. Ezio knew there was one in the house, but when Lucy had first had a suspicion that the Bleeding was worsening, she'd taken it from him and hidden it.

It was quite possible that Ezio wasn't trying to escape at all, but was pretending, hoping that they would panic and think that he'd found the blade and would be very dangerous with it… Hoping that in their panic they would go to see if it was still in its hiding place and he'd be able to see it. Would know where it was, so when he was truly ready to escape he could do so quietly, without notice, and potentially leave no witnesses in his wake.

Lucy had never realized, before that point, how truly intimidating an assassin could be. Not until she'd thrown open the bathroom door and seen Ezio trying to squeeze out through the window and locked eyes with him.

There was nothing in his face but hatred and anger and confusion. And worse than that… He had the audacity to sit there and continue to stare at her even after she'd drawn her stungun and pointed it at him.

"We're trying to help you, Ezio. You have to understand that. We're like you. We are not your enemy."

He hadn't even blinked, just ducked his head under the sill and attempted to continue out into the growing storm as casually and innocently as if he did it every day.

And she panicked a little because even though she was halfway certain now that these escape attempts were just a ploy, there was still part of her that was terrified at the concept of losing them. So she just said it and let the fear color her voice, let the truth be known because if he was only trying to get away from them, he would leave, and if it was just a test, he would stay, he'd have to.

"They have The Rose, Ezio!"

And he stopped, turned his head and glared at her again. But this time there was something else in his gaze. Something sharp and deadly. It was the very point where he and his weapon became one, and Lucy found herself staring at its edge.

"There is no such thing… It is a myth. I searched for it for years. So did HE and look where we are becau—"

"It's real… It's real and they have it."

He grinned. A grin that made her think of Desmond, and suddenly she didn't see Ezio in his face anymore, it was only Desmond and she couldn't do it. She couldn't pull the trigger and stop him.

He knocked his knuckles against his chest and disappeared out the window.

Lucy stared at the black rectangle he'd left, snow blowing wildly in and ground her teeth. She wasn't one to curse, it always left her with the taste of Dial soap in her mouth, memories of her grandmother scolding and pushing young Lucy's head over the sink and shoving one of those disgusting yellow bars between her teeth. _'Recite! RECITE!'_

"FUCK!" Her voice was shrill with emotion and she lowered the stungun and gripped her brow with the other hand.

She stomped to the window and stared out, looking for any sign of where he landed and where he'd gone—

"A peculiar thing, The Rose… One understands, simply gazing upon it, that such a thing is special, important in some fashion… One becomes covetous of it, much like the other Pieces. But where the others can corrupt with their power, and enslave the minds of men, the Rose simply is what it is. And cannot be opened, nor used, unless it wants to be."

Ezio was perched on the thin, miniscule ledge of the chimney above her head, smoke obscuring him save his eyes, squinted because of the acidity of the smoke, but vigilant.

Lucy let out her pent up breath in a whoosh and sagged a little in relief.

He looked down at her and seemed, perhaps as if he were on some level, made of smoke himself; "In my life time, I came across many such artifacts. Things that could not be explained… The Rose, unfortunately, I have very few memories of. I encountered it within the last remaining days before my life slipped into my descendant—" He grinned wistfully; "Such a strange feeling, realizing you are no longer yourself, but part of a child only just created—" His head shook, as if clearing such fanciful thoughts like he would shake water from his hair; "I remember thinking it was very pretty, and when I picked it up it—it sang to me… Inside my head." He touched his brow. "It seemed oh so pleased that I had picked it up. Like a child grateful to be saved from violation. I felt—in that moment—so increasingly sad for it… Out of all the Pieces, I have encountered only a handful I think to be truly innocent and without malice. The Rose, I believe is one of them."

"You're not worried that they'll find a way to use it?"

He shrugged; "It is possible, but highly unlikely." He smirked; "I could not even open it, so what does that tell you?"

"If there is a way to open it, the Templars will find it."

He didn't seem to react, but his eyes shifted somewhat, and Lucy knew the discussion was over.

"Why don't you come back inside, Ezio, where it's warm."

"Do you know why a caged bird sings, Lucy?"

She didn't answer.

"It sings not to please its masters, nor in joy of its fearless comforts, but weeps for what it will never know."

"Have you been reading Mia Angelou?"

His brow wrinkled and he peered down at her curiously; "Who?"

"Never mind…" She sighed; "Just, please, come back inside soon?"

He tipped his chin once, and turned his eyes outward, catching the movement of each snowflake and shift of bare tree branches.

She stepped back from the window and went into the hall, leaning her shoulders against the wall, head bowed into her hand. Oh, Jesus, what was she doing? He could so easily just leave now. Just climb down and walk away and she wouldn't know until she got worried and looked back outside.

Ezio was dangerous. He was stubborn and felt trapped and he was likely to do something stupid to make his point.

Since the day she'd started suspecting Desmond was experiencing Bleeds, she'd begun sheltering him. Keeping a close watch—a tight leash, on him. Trying to protect him…

But to Desmond, Ezio and Altair, it felt as if she didn't trust them… Felt as if they were prisoners. They felt angry and betrayed…

_I have to trust that he'll come back… I have to give him a little bit of freedom and trust them to make the right choice._ She scowled at herself; _If this is what parenthood is like, I don't think I ever want to have kids… _

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Shaun liked Altair. Not just because he thought the man was fascinating… But because when Altair was in control, he was practically immobile. Parked in bed reclined and nested in pillows and blankets reading, breathing deliberately slow and even.

He was never loud and obnoxious like Desmond, never angry and brooding and staring as if ready to slit your throat like Ezio. Altair was very unobtrusive, and when he spoke it was no nonsense, he just got right to the point, as best he could.

Unfortunately Altair was never in control for long, and he gave it up without much fuss to whoever came forward first it seemed. When Shaun asked him why that was he said simply; "If allowing them to step forward without fight retains his health then so be it."

Shaun still didn't entirely understand why he was letting them shove him back like that, when they would stay in control for days at a time. It didn't seem rightly fair, you see… but then again, Shaun didn't really know his thought process… Maybe Altair enjoyed that blackness in the rear of Desmond's pea-sized-mind.

Shaun sighed and silently continued writing his observations and searching-searching-searching for someone he thought worthy of taking his place here with the Animus Team. Lucy would tell him not to worry about it, that everything would go fine and he'd be back in a week with no fuss…

Shaun, though, knew what was at risk, and he refused to go into a situation like this without some form of backup plan.

Rebecca, oddly enough, seemed to be the only one who actually understood. She made suggestions, actually made suggestions that were well thought out and not her being stupid.

"What about this guy? He's from Canada." She said in an e-mail, "I think it would be appropriate… Bring the two bloodlines back together."

Shaun blinked at the computer screen and turned just ever-so-slightly green about the gills.

How ironic, he thought, and pulled at the collar of his sweater. He replied to the message with two sentences;

"Despite my unease over WHO he is, his qualifications are alright. He'll have to do."

Rebecca's expression remained unchanged but the message she sent back betrayed her cool, calm exterior;

"He already knows, Shaun. And you need to stop worrying, everything'll turn out alright in the end. This is all too weird to just be a coincidence anyway…"

He sighed and didn't bother typing his reply, just stood and walked toward the kitchen, pausing long enough behind Rebecca's shoulder to place his hand there, as if drawing some of her certainty, her faith into himself because it was quite obvious that he had none.

She patted his hand; "Don't sweat the small stuff, Shaun… We've got bigger fish to fry."

He hummed; "You really don't know how hungry you just made me there… I'd sell my left testicle for some fish and chips right about now."

She laughed quietly and shook her head, shrugging from under his hand as she continued on tinkering, typing in endless lines of code and numbers.

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A blizzard was brewing outside, spitting fat flakes and howling arctic winds without mercy. But they didn't have much choice in the matter of safe houses. And their current one was ticking closer and closer to its expiration date. To stay hidden, they had to constantly be on the move. Hiding in shadows and lurking in doorways. It was given. These were dangerous times, they had to be on constant alert.

One morning, Ezio hunched over the table eating granola cereal by the heaping spoonful, talking quietly with Rebecca about the 'lesser' pieces of Eden he'd encountered, watching with a detached kind of amusement as she scribbled down what each of them did as he described them, since Shaun was still asleep.

"—It really did nothing interesting." He said; "But if you held it up to the sun and looked through the glass, lines would appear that told you the direction… I remember Leonardo liked to lay on his back on the roof and gaze through it for hours."

"Maybe it showed him something you couldn't see?"

He shrugged; "These things were not like the others… Not like the Apples, or the Staff. These things held no malice. They simply were what they were and they had no intent of their own."

She nodded and looked over the list she'd made; "What about the Mirror. You never really explained that one."

He gave a single nod of his head; "I did not like that one… It made me feel watched, but the thing itself could not be destroyed. I tried multiple times to break it, or to melt it thinking perhaps it might be metal instead of glass. But as it was simply, it did next to nothing… Every so often a small symbol would blink in its corners, or it would go completely black for days… The only time it seemed to actually do what I assume it was supposed to do, was when it was submerged in water."

"In water?"

He nodded.

"When it was put into water, and you were to look straight down into it—it… it showed you things. Strange things."

"Like what?"

"I-I only looked into it once like that… I allowed others to try, but I never did it myself again."

"What did it do?"

"It showed me the darkness between all things."

Rebecca didn't like the look in his eye, so she changed the subject. "Okay… Were there any others?"

He thought for a moment, then nodded; "There was a bowl…"

"A bowl?"

He nodded; "It was a very ugly little thing." He held his hands up, indicating a thing about six inches across and two or three inches deep. "I rather liked this one. It did not do anything on its own. You had to have intent to make it work." He munched quietly for a few seconds on his cereal eyes distant, almost wistful. "It was a very ugly little bowl… But, I kept it on a table in my home, and every day would put four pieces of silver into it."

She blinked dully; "Is that all it did? Hold your spare change?"

He shook his head; "No, I encountered it quite by accident in my travels. It was extraordinarily ugly, and caught my eye in a market… I think I gave the woman two coins for it?" His eyes became distant as he thought, then shook his head and continued; "I kept it in my bag for a while, hidden below quite a lot of things… I used it for shaving a few times actually;" He chuckled. "Then one morning I had hold of it and was thinking 'How much can it actually hold?' so I dipped it into a fountain but it didn't seem to hold any water… No matter how many times I dipped it in, the water just seemed to drain out again. I thought it had a hole in it so I turned it over to look and all these THINGS just dumped out of it onto my feet!" He was smiling fondly. "Everyone looked at me and I must admit I did make an unusual scene, standing there holding a small bowl that seemed to empty continuously onto my feet." His arms spread wide; "Buckets and buckets of water came out of it, old fish bones, coins from places I had never been, jewelry, bits of old rotten food, an old knife!" His hands came close and made a rolling motion as if illustrating everything just emptying out of it; "On and on and on it kept emptying! And I had become quite frightened by that point, so I turned it back over and left as quickly as I could… When I arrived back in my home, I found a few boys milling about and with their help held the thing turned over for five hours collecting and sorting the things that came out of it in such an unending stream!" He chuckled; "Finally they became so sorely frightened themselves they fled screaming sorcery."

"Did it ever empty out?"

He shook his head; "I became so weary of holding it tipped over I finally just put it on the table in my home and started feeding things back into it." He propped his chin on his hand; "It really was such an ugly bowl…"

"What happened to it?"

He shrugged. "It was lost when my home was destroyed." A sigh; "I think, perhaps I would like to find it again."

Rebecca chuckled at the wistful, nostalgic look on his face and was opening her mouth to ask what he would do if he did find it again when Lucy strode purposefully into the room.

Ezio's shoulders squared upon her arrival and he bent over his cereal again.

Lucy looked at him with a somewhat pained expression on her face and announced in a low, calm voice that they were moving.

Rebecca leaned back in her seat and rubbed her face; "When?"

"Three days, I want to be out of here when they go after the Blanks." She turned to Ezio, noticing that dazed, separated look in his eyes that meant there was more than one person looking at her. "So, we've got three days to figure out exactly how to separate the three of you." She took a deep breath and let it out; "I want to try loading all of you into the Animus at once."

His adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, it looked quite difficult, and his skin had gone paler than usual. But he nodded, Ezio's voice leaving his throat when he spoke; "W-we will not disappear?"

"I want to try, if it looks or feels like something's not right, Becca put in an emergency eject button."

The half of his face that was Ezio scrunched up in confusion and alarm; "Eject?"

"It'll pop you out if something goes wrong… It's really risky, but it's better than being a vegetable." Rebecca clicked her pen a few times as emphasis.

And he gave a little shiver, the left side of his body seeming to just slllliiiiiiip, and a queasy, almost sickened expression came over his face… All of his face. He gave a full body shiver and pushed the bowl of granola away, leaning back in his seat with his nose wrinkled up distastefully.

Lucy didn't like that expression. "Are you alright?"

"I guess he doesn't want to participate."

Lucy sighed, irritably and left.

Rebecca tapped her pen on the table a few times, propped her jaw on her hand and looked Desmond right in the eye, no, past his eyes looking for Ezio; "You're a big baby, you know that?"

Desmond felt his brows drawing down in disapproval and had the distinct impression that Ezio had been listening, just hiding behind his figurative shoulder… And more likely than not, Altair was back there with him, watching.

Desmond had felt hopeless, helpless now for quite some time. He'd tried to hide it behind laughter and a mask of optimism, but that mask was wearing thin, as was his patience…

He wanted his body back. He wanted his LIFE back—He wanted a LIFE. This war had killed him once, he wouldn't let it happen again. But what choice did he have now? He was trapped in this, just like Ezio and Altair were trapped in his mind.

His palm slammed onto the table top hard enough to rattle the spoon in the cereal bowl, and Desmond was suddenly on his feet, stomping after Lucy with a determined scowl on his face.

Lucy heard him coming and turned from the papers she'd been flipping through, something Shaun had printed out and asked her to take a look at. Desmond looked plainly angry, even though that was a weak estimate, but considering his physical appearance at the moment, he looked more like someone who would whine and cry and complain at you instead of someone who could kill you in fifteen different ways before you even knew what had hit you.

And then something peculiar happened. Desmond's left ankle wobbled, his right hand lifted to his brow and Lucy could almost see someone right behind Desmond's shoulder, overlapping him, and she ground her teeth in trepidation.

Desmond was confused at first, wondering if perhaps he hadn't stood up too fast because the world was spinning. Then he wondered if maybe he was about to pass out, something he'd felt he was on the verge of now for days. He was overcome by that strange feeling again, his whole left side was numb and when he tried to move only his right side responded at first, the left seeming to stumble and reluctantly follow. He was reminded of times he'd seen three legged races, or tug-of-wars. Half of him did not belong to him anymore. And his vocal cords seemed unable to handle two people trying to use them at once just stopped working all together.

He couldn't even imagine what he must look like, stumbling around, bouncing off the wall, scowling, maybe even drooling. He would be willing to bet he looked like a zombie.

"Stop—STOP!" Lucy grabbed both shoulders and pressed him against the wall. Eyes worried but commanding. "Sit down. We'll take this one at a time."

Both legs seemed to want to step forward at the time and Desmond, as well as his unknown guest, crumpled to the floor.

Breath woofed out of his lungs and finally his voice cut through. One having the upper hand and using it to their advantage;

"Idiota… Don't move when I move!"

"Stop it! Both of you…" Lucy winced and dropped to her knees; "You have to work together or you'll end up hurting yourself… selves."

His eyes rolled, and Lucy thought it was probably the only thing she'd seen them do together peacefully.

"Okay… What are you trying to do?"

Ezio spoke in a matter-of-fact voice; "You said that all three of us must be aware at once."

Her eyes widened and her lips parted in surprise; "A-are you?" Her hands tightened on his shirt; "Are all three of you there? W-where's Altair?"

"Hiding… The piece of shit."

Her face fell.

Ezio snarled and thumped his fist on the floor; "I looked up to him and he's nothing but a bully! Treats me like a child despite the fact I am twice his age! This is Hell! I swear to you, it is HELL!" He was still a moment, then as if a light bulb went on in his mind he rolled and slapped at the right side of his face, the half Desmond found himself in charge of. "And that's for the misery you put me through!"

Desmond covered his cheek, feeling insulted and somehow freakish that the left side of his body was abusing him. Since Ezio seemed to have nothing further to say and was content to just lay there drumming his fingers on his chest Desmond decided the best course of action was to try and speak, just to see if he could, or if Ezio had won control of that as well.

"I think I liked doing this with Altair better… And what do you mean you're older than him?"

"If I understand correctly how this contraption works I will only remember what has happened until the point there is a child that will eventually lead to you… I apparently didn't father such a child until I was much older than either of you." He sounded proud of himself.

"And how old is Altair?"

"Old enough it seems… He is too serious, and always so depressing. I told him to go cry in a corner and he shut me away for days. Mistreats his elders… Bastardo."

Lucy scrubbed her forehead. It was hard to watch, harder still to wrap her mind around. Desmond was lying there having a conversation with himself, and every so often one eye or the other would blink. She was tempted to put a mirror against the bridge of his nose to try and get a whole picture and to ease the headache it was causing. At least the illusion of two people would be easier to handle than this…

"Okay, Boys… Lying in the floor all day isn't safe, so how about we either get you in bed so you're more comfortable, or into a chair."

"Yes, a chair!" Ezio tried to lever himself up but Desmond was lagging, content to just lie there, so he slapped him again. "Come on, Boy."

Lucy didn't think the image of lunacy could be more complete, but then Desmond seemed to give himself the finger.

They managed to work together long enough to get into a chair.

"How does this move?" Ezio kicked and the chair rolled a little way.

"It has wheels on it." Lucy called, following close behind, feeling very mother hennish. She managed to catch them before they hit a wall and pushed the chair into the kitchen. "Okay, so, we've established that the two of you can be in control at once and only minimal chaos ensues… Dare we try all three of you?"

"I don't see how it would work." Desmond said and motioned to his two halves. "I've only got two arms and two legs."

"Yes, but we have to have all three of you aware at the same time to get you all three into the loading screen at once… Can you two communicate telepathically?"

"No. I was not even aware of Altair's presence until two weeks ago." Ezio started picking at the granola cereal again. "I was in here looking for food—Why is it whenever I'm awake I'm so hungry?"

Desmond dropped his cheek into his palm but didn't have time to seize control of his voice long enough to answer.

"But while I was looking for acceptable food I found myself completely unable to move and he spoke, he asked if I knew how to cook and if I did if I would prepare a certain dish. I thought he was this one—" He motioned to his right side; "But the accent was wrong… Why did no one tell me we were related?" His face screwed up in rage.

"Can I talk now?" Desmond folded his arm over his half of his chest and turned to Lucy; "You said you needed all three of us aware at the same time?"

"Yeah."

"That's happened before… The day you Shaun and Becca told me what was going on. There at first we were all aware at once, I felt both of them but Altair wouldn't let us move. It was really strange, compacted, like we were all being squished together…"

"Like the Bleed you and Ezio had?"

Ezio nodded and Desmond felt seasick. "Yes, it was less than pleasant."

"You were completely freaking out."

"Don't be stupid," And he kept control to prevent Desmond from arguing with him. "How can all three be aware at once without becoming one?"

"Maybe if you're all in control of something different? Like, instead of splitting vertically, how about we try it by section? Or let Altair have control of your voice for a while. That might work."

Desmond didn't like that idea one bit, and since Ezio didn't seem to want to let him speak any time soon, he pulled a napkin out of the little forked holder on the table and a pen from his pocket, writing quickly that he didn't like the idea of only having minimal control of his body, especially his voice, because in the animus that was basically all he had to communicate with.

"It will only last long enough to perform the transfers, then you'll have your body back, and Ezio and Altair will have their own."

Ezio was fidgeting, "What if we disappear?"

"What?" Lucy sat down across from them.

He sighed and Desmond felt seasick again when his head shook; "There really is not sleep in here… There is just awareness of nothing. It's all black and pressing and soundless… I-I do not enjoy that feeling. And it leaves all of us exhausted."

Desmond rubbed at his cheek, wincing… There went another piece of his macho exterior. And then a cold knife slipped into the base of his mind… Was that where Altair was right now? Was Altair purposefully, and willingly locking himself back in that nothingness?

He turned the napkin over and wrote slowly; _'Let's try to get all three of us awake at once… but I want to be lying down.'_

Lucy nodded. "We'll go back into the work room and you can lay down. That sound good to you?"

"Yes, I don't see how Altair can stand being alone like that for so long… It would drive me insane. Should I communicate like this as well? With writing?"

"If Altair has control of your voice, then yes."

"I cannot write this language. I only know to speak it because of the time our minds were meshed."

"That's fine, Rebecca speaks Italian."

The left side of his face looked suddenly incredulous; "She speaks…" He thudded his fist on the tabletop but said no more.

Lucy shook her head and pushed the chair toward the workroom then watched with detached amusement as Desmond's body stood, awkwardly, and practically just fell backward against the pillows and laid there.

The next fifteen minutes were spent trying to coax Altair into waking up.

It was strange how it was done. Desmond could picture, in his mind, little versions of himself and Ezio moving about in a large open space in his consciousness. Like a giant windowless dark warehouse. There was no sound, but they could sense, almost feel, where they were going.

Altair was back there, near the farthest end of his mind, sitting hunched over hugging his knees.

They couldn't speak back there, or maybe they didn't know how, but it was almost like finding someone under water, feeling their shape with your hands, identifying they were there and alive and you weren't alone.

Altair didn't want to move. When they pulled at him, trying to draw him forward toward consciousness, he resisted. But it seemed that being an immaterial bundle of thought and consciousness was kind of the opposite of being a physical person, and despite the fact he resisted, they were able to pull him forward quite easily, close enough to the front of their shared mind that he could hear and see what was going on.

"Stop being such an asshole… We're trying to fix this mess!" Desmond heard himself speaking his thoughts, disturbed slightly that it sounded so slurred and weak.

Lucy's face changed, looking relieved, and he wondered when she'd become worried.

"Jesus," she said; "Don't do that again, guys… I couldn't get any response from you at all! I was afraid you'd slipped into a coma." She pushed her bangs off her forehead and let out a breath in a whoosh, waving Rebecca away where the other woman was bending close, face worried.

"Sorry."

Altair was moving, writhing uncomfortably it seemed, trying to escape and shrink back into the darkness.

Ezio's side of the body shifted; "You're terribly stubborn. If we are to separate we must all be aware at one time, otherwise we risk killing one another."

Lucy leaned closer with wide eyes; "What's he doing?" she whispered, as if should she be quiet and peer closely enough into Desmond's eyes she would be able to see Altair.

"He's like a spoiled little girl child! Runs and hides when the game does not fall in his favor!" Ezio twisted slightly.

And then there was a thick string of Arabic and Desmond's hand was suddenly not in his control and had slapped the left side of his face. In the time that Altair had been aware of himself and aware of Ezio stuck in there with him, he'd been attempting to remain civil. He relinquished control, bowed out of fights and arguments, made sure Ezio and Desmond didn't end up killing one another, or themselves. It had been a very, very long time since Altair had been able to actually rest. And it had been longer still since he had been graced with a moment's peace that was not that unrelenting BLACKNESS in the closets of Desmond's mind. He'd gone a little mad back there. Having very little other than his thoughts roaring and shouting that this proved there was no higher power, that this proved there was only chaos… And Altair was damned tired of it. He wanted this to be over. He wanted to SLEEP goddamn it!

And Desmond was caught in the middle of it… literally. It seemed, at the moment, the only part of himself he had control of was his right foot and maybe his nose, but flaring his nostrils and kicking only seemed to add to the chaos of the two halves of his body fighting one another.

Lucy stumbled back a step in shock, watching as Desmond's two hands seemed possessed, slapping and grabbing at one another, punching and scratching and leaving bloody grooves in his skin—And that's when she drew the line. She wouldn't have these two strangers hurting Desmond. He hadn't asked for this to happen, they had no right.

"Stop it! Boys, STOP IT!" And she threw herself on top of him, grabbed one wrist in each hand and pinned them both above his head, sitting straddle of his waist.

The struggling ceased almost immediately and Desmond's face was a strange mash of about five different emotions, although the left side was primarily grinning and looking slightly aroused… And if the growing firmness against her behind was any clue—She wrinkled her nose in disgust and focused on the left side of Desmond's face; "Ezio… You're a horny pig, and if I wouldn't be hurting Desmond in the process I'd kick you in the balls."

His eye looked perfectly insulted but the right side of his face suddenly burst out laughing. It was a strange hiccupping sound, a mixture of Desmond's laugh, and what she assumed was Altair's.

She rolled carefully off of him and sat back in her chair, just looking at him for a few moments, trying to conjure up boundaries in her mind of where one person stopped and another began. It was eerie, that was for certain. Where as before she'd been able to sense Desmond, or whoever was in control by themselves, this time, she could sense all three at once. It honestly felt like there were three physical people laying there on that bed, perhaps all joined at the hip or something, despite the fact she saw only one… it gave her the beginnings of a very bad headache, so she closed her eyes and took a moment, just a short little moment to scream in her head and shout that it had worked. It didn't seem to be traumatic, aside from Altair and Ezio fighting, and all three of them were there at once. Maybe everything would turn out alright in the end. Maybe there was still hope. "Alright, so all three of you are in control at once?"

"Yeah." Desmond's voice was slightly slurred, but having three people trying to use it at once could do that to a person.

"Okay, so who has what?"

"Ezio's got the left side held hostage… I've got my right leg and I think I can wiggle my nose. Altair has the right hand and we're sharing the eye and ear. Oh, and that?" Desmond tone indicated his crotch; "That's all Ezio at the moment."

"Can you feel it?"

"Unfortunately, no, why?"

Lucy gave Ezio a meaningful stare and he flinched, drawing his knee upward a little incase she decided she didn't care if she hurt Desmond or not.

Rebecca came back over about then tapping a spiral bound notebook against her palm. "Everything OK?"

Lucy nodded and turned to look at her, sweeping her hair from her brow.

Rebecca let out a slow breath and motioned over her shoulder; "I was going over some figures earlier, and if all that commotion means what I dearly hope it means, you've got all three of them there at once… So, we can do a dry run. Stick him in the Animus and see if we can actually put all three of them into the loading screen or if they have to be more than just semi aware… Plus it'd give them a chance to actually interact… We just have to keep a close eye on his stats and pull them out if anything starts to look funky."

Lucy's brow creased as she took in everything the other woman wasn't saying. The risks, what could happen if it didn't work… But what it would mean if it did, and turned back to them, eyebrows raised; "What do you guys think?"

Since Desmond kind of flailed a little and seemed to be trying to sit up she supposed they were in agreement. She just prayed that it wasn't a mistake.

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	4. Chapter 4

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**Chapter 4; Templar Frogs**

They managed to wriggle around into a sitting position on the edge of the bed, and with Lucy as a kind of brace were able to stand.

"Hey, Shaun, come give us a hand!"

He sighed audibly and stood from his seat, walking over with his arms crossed and an eyebrow lifted. "How can I be of service to the mental Frankenstein's Monster."

"You can help me get him into the Animus, we're going to try loading all three of them."

Shaun looked for a moment shocked, but he shook it off quickly enough and nodded. "How do we go about it? Are you going to walk?" He clasped the younger man's left elbow in firm, but gentle hands and offered his shoulder as support.

And Desmond's legs wouldn't move. They made a few halfhearted attempts at moving, but every time they actually got down to doing it, it was almost as if he were trying to jump instead of walk. Shaun thought it was very irritating and even said as much.

"Fuck it… I'm just going to carry you, right?" And Shaun bent, ground his teeth, eyebrows scrunching, and with a growl of indignation he caught Desmond's body around the knees, shoulder in the younger man's gut and lifted him bodily up.

Lucy made a soft worried noise and balanced a hand on his back.

Ezio grunted uncomfortably and grabbed the back of Shaun's sweater for balance, but Altair just chuckled and slapped Shaun's ass, calling out in a rather amused tone; "You walk too slow! _Hyah!"_

Desmond whined; "Please, Altair I'm begging you, don't do that again. That's my hand."

Shaun dropped him unceremoniously into the Animus and propped his fists on his hips, glaring at Desmond's right eye, where he associated Altair to begin and spoke in an indignant tone… In what Desmond recognized immediately as Arabic.

Altair seemed impressed because his eyebrow crooked up and his side of the mouth quirked up approvingly.

Lucy appeared to the right and waited patiently until Altair lifted his hand for her.

Desmond decided he didn't mind this as much anymore. Altair had control of his arm so he didn't have to feel that damned needle sliding under his skin. He had an irrational fear of needles…

Rebecca called out a sequence of numbers to Lucy and the blonde sank into her seat, eyes wary, almost fearful even as she gave the brunette a nod.

Rebecca patted her chest and glanced up, muttering a quick prayer to the god or goddess of technical support, and clicked 'ACCEPT'.

Desmond felt very nauseous, worried, but almost giddy at the same time. If this worked it would only be a matter of hours before he had his body to himself again. Only a few hours until he'd be able to sleep. He chuckled in his head and the Animus hummed beneath him, everything above and below him fading into white—

The next second he felt like he'd been punched, right where brain became spinal cord. A hot, hard unforgiving drill of force, and two voices cried out in shock behind him as he stumbled and fell onto his face.

He lay there for a long few moments just breathing. Eyes closed, focused on nothing but the internal processes of his body and the solidity of the loading screen 'floor' beneath him.

Falling hadn't hurt, but his mind told him it should so he slowly sat up scrubbing his knees and scowling with his teeth bared. He opened his eyes slowly and at first saw only what was usually there. Whiteness, something that resembled mist, but if you looked at it close enough was just very dense pockets of tiny, microscopic numbers and molecular diagrams. Layered over, between and within this were a few skittering lines of barrier script, code and every so often a cryptic looking symbol or shape. But when he turned his head, scanning all around him, his eyes stopped dead and a cold weight settled into his stomach.

Altair was slowly sitting up, shoving his hood back, blinking in surprise at the two men there in the whiteness with him.

Ezio, on the other hand, was still on the ground, ass in the air, looking humiliated if the shaking of his fists could be trusted. He shouted vilely in Italian and shoved himself to his hands and knees, turning and baring his teeth at the two of them like an angry dog.

And that's when Desmond finally got a look at the two people who'd made his life a living hell the past two months… it's also then that he noticed the differences, the inconsistencies.

Ezio didn't look to be in his sixties. He was wearing his Master's blacks… But he looked much younger. He looked like the loud mouthed, pigheaded kid who'd been within a hair's breadth of a blood drenched massacre after his father and brothers were executed.

Altair was in a similar state. Some of the scars and signs of age Desmond remembered him gaining in the time after he'd become Grandmaster and before he'd met back up with Maria Thorpe were missing. Most noticeably, the gash across the left side of his face that had opened up his cheek and taken off a chunk of his ear. Desmond remembered that specifically because it had been one of the reasons he hadn't taken off his hood when he'd found Maria… He was a terribly self conscious creature.

The three of them stared at one another without blinking for a long long while. Then Altair scoffed in agitation and crossed his arms on top of his knees; "Disrespecting your elders my ass… you're nothing but a child playing in your father's shoes."

Ezio's face became a contorted, enraged mask of wide eyes, arched brows and shining teeth. "You take that back you son of a bitch!" And he launched himself like a rabid dog at Altair.

Altair pinned him quickly and scowled down at Ezio's gnashed teeth and foaming mouth; "You are too unstable. Emotional like a woman."

Desmond sighed and climbed to his feet, shooing Altair away from him and glaring warningly at Ezio; "We're stuck together for who knows how long yet, there's no use fighting like this! If you're so intent on having it out wait until you're not in my body anymore! I feel like a schizophrenic or that guy from _Fight Club_ with the two of you beating me up like this!" He didn't mention the fact that every time they fought he started feeling dizzy, light headed and as if he might simply lose consciousness all together. He didn't mention that he feared he wouldn't wake up again if he did.

Ezio's face bunched up and he looked Desmond over; "You're too thin… I could break you in half with very little effort—"

Desmond scoffed indignantly.

"—I think perhaps he's right though… Once we're separated I'll show both of you not to fuck with an Auditore!"

Altair just blinked and his mouth quirked up slightly. He didn't look threatened, or impressed.

Desmond rubbed his eyes feeling as if his head were trying to ache, a dull pressure behind his eyes and the base of his skull. "Well, this is the strangest experience of my life by far…" he sighed; "Alright, well… What now?"

And Lucy's voice came out of everywhere at once, quiet, slightly distorted by the computer but plainly and wonderfully glad; "Your stats look really good, you can stay in the loading screen and talk to us, or Becca and Shaun have designed a training program for you to play around in." Behind her they could hear Rebecca and Shaun talking excitedly as they put on headsets and prepared to plug in.

"It's basically just different realistic environments you can run through. Kind of a big empty city… There aren't any people to interact with, we were worried what might happen, so we've hidden markers you can find." Shaun sounded very excited, Desmond was a little surprised that Shaun even knew how to feel excited and that particular emotion hadn't just been systematically bred out of his family.

Rebecca spoke in a singsong voice; "It's like _Sonic the Hedgehog._ You just find big glowing rings and shit while dodging the Templar Frogs."

"Templar Frogs?"

"Yeah, they're big frogs in Templar gear. If one of them jumps on you it takes all of your loot and you have to go kill it to get it back."

"That's fucked up, Becca." Desmond crouched and crossed his arms over his knees.

"It's either that or she's rigged up DDR." Shaun didn't sound too enthusiastic.

"I have a strange desire to see Altair dancing to Michael Jackson and Lady Gaga… Sue me."

Altair's face twitched uncertainly; "What?"

Desmond's shoulders slumped and he dropped his chin between his knees, folding his arms around his head.

"Well, you two are going to have to learn about the twenty-first century outside of Desmond's head sometime. Might as well start with something entertaining."

Shaun grumbled unintelligibly.

Lucy piped up, silencing the others in a… polite way; "In all seriousness though, Desmond. Would you three like to just stretch your legs where you are, or would you like to try and do something. The scavenger hunt Shaun and Becca made is kind of a test to see if the three of you can act independently within the Animus without taxing your mind and body too much."

Desmond heard in his head what she wasn't saying; _'We want to see how far we can push you before you start bleeding together again.'_

"The DDR is for reflex testing… I hope. But I've also got something. It's more serious though. I've got a list of questions I want to ask Altair and Ezio to see how much you bled together before you became three distinct entities…"

"Why?"

She sighed, cleared her throat and answered; "I want to find out why they didn't completely bleed into you… This isn't the first time Abstergo has used the Animus to extract genetic memory… We've recovered a handful of others who have been sedated because of their compromised mental state. If the bleeding is only a temporary thing until enough information is present to facilitate… to—"

"Until they become aware of themselves." Shaun put in quietly.

"—Thank you…" Lucy released a relieved breath. "If it's only temporary, we might be able to help some of these people, Desmond."

Altair and Ezio were staring at him.

Ezio released a blast of frustrated breath and lowered himself into a relaxed supine position, arms crossed behind his head just glad to have a body of his own for a while, even if it was inside whatever the Animus was… a fancy chair is what he thought, "Why can't we do all three?"

"You'll play DDR?" Rebecca sounded almost as if she were going to burst.

Shaun groaned; "Can we perhaps do something productive first? Let Lucy ask her questions, then, while I'm having my tea in the kitchen you can have your fun with the stupid dancing game."

Lucy, Shaun and Rebecca spoke to one another quietly and Lucy was left alone to ask the questions.

Desmond walked a way's off simply for common courtesy's sake to let Altair and Ezio feel like they had some privacy and sprawled himself back on the ground, drumming his fingers on his chest with his eyes closed.

It wasn't until Ezio shouted in alarm that Desmond jerked himself fully aware again—And realized, to his own shock, that he was no longer laying on the floor… But was at a right angle to Altair and Ezio.

It was the strangest thing. He still felt 'gravity' pulling at his back, but suddenly, for him at least, the ground was not where it had been moments before.

Lucy was chattering quickly, her voice quiet, obviously calling out to Rebecca and Shaun to 'come here! You have GOT to see this!'

"How did you do that!" Ezio had his hood shoved back and was staring at him in amazement. "One moment you were over there, the next you go floating by!"

He honestly didn't know how he'd done it, and what was worse, he didn't know how to undo it. He tried just walking toward where he guessed the floor was and trying to step back onto it from the wall… But there was nothing there to step on, he just kept walking.

Altair bent, hands on his knees and stared. "What else can you do in this place? Is it like a dream?" He gave a little stomp, as if to test the ground's solidity. "I dreamed once that I had wings, is that possible here?"

Rebecca and Shaun came back, Shaun's headset screeched as he turned it back on and settled into his chair. "What the hell have you done now, Desmond!"

Ezio had a hand over his mouth, rubbing compulsively at his scar. "This place is ruled by the mind… Just like dreaming."

Rebecca wasn't using her headset but her voice could still be heard, quiet, technical as she read over code and called out translations; "Nothing is different, he's just… On a 'Y' axis instead of the 'X' axis. It's just a glitch… Not harmful at all, but I'll have it fixed before we do this for real, don't worry."

"Why can I walk through the floor?" He did it again, stepping back and forth near Ezio's heel.

Ezio clicked his fingers, turned his back to Desmond and held his arms out, eyes closed… And gave a little leap—

He landed hard at Desmond's feet, and after he'd coughed a little, sat up grinning.

Altair crossed his arms.

The next ten minutes were spent in much the same fashion. Desmond, Altair and Ezio trying to find that perfect balance between the X and Y where there was no ground, but perfect weightlessness.

Every so often Rebecca would chime in with a suggestion or Shaun would swallow a mouthful of tea and hum quietly.

Lucy continued asking her questions.

"When did you realize you were here instead of there?"

Altair was standing on the ceiling at that point, a good three stories above Desmond, and Ezio who had managed somehow to find himself on the negative side of the X axis was laying on his stomach under Desmond's feet watching Altair with a grin on his face.

"The first time I was completely aware there was water… the shower." Altair scratched his neck. "I realized my head hurt terribly, and for a moment I couldn't feel my right side. I thought Maria had killed me, the next second I'd fallen and the water was hitting my face, and Shaun was there."

Desmond made a surprised sound; "Hey, I remember that!" He pointed up at Altair; "So that's why Shaun was looking at me weird when I woke up!"

"I thought you'd had a stroke, your whole right side was limp and he couldn't speak." Shaun said into his cup. "The girls were out, so I just carried you to bed and tried my damnedest to make you comfortable… I stepped out to get the first aid kit and when I came back he was standing by the window with a sheet tied around his waist brandishing a pencil at me."

Altair cleared his throat; "The very first time I was aware of something being out of place though… I thought I was asleep in Masyaf… I woke and everything looked strange, I could see the outline of this place over everything else. Like ghosts."

Ezio yawned; "I became aware of myself while he was running away from Templars. I couldn't control anything, or speak, couldn't at first understand what he was saying, but for almost a week I was like a hat to him I suppose. Then one morning I found he was asleep, but I was not. I walked around for some time, just looking at things, I watched the sunrise and then found myself unable to move again, as you had woken. Everything grew stronger after that, so I suppose I was becoming more myself."

Lucy hummed in agreement and let out a low sigh; "Okay, well, that's the end of my questioning for now. The rest I'd like to do individually outside the Animus."

"So I can start the game now?" Rebecca sounded a little too eager to Desmond, but he didn't say so.

"Get them all back on the X axis and then you can start the game."

"Guys, you've got five seconds before I hit the Rumble button!"

"Rumble button?" Desmond cocked his head to the side. "What the hell is the Rumble button?"

"Do you really want to wait around and find out?" Shaun said calmly, still sipping at his tea.

"FIVE!"

Ezio rolled into a sitting position and seemed to do a backward summersault and wound up sitting back on the positive side of the X axis right by Desmond's heel.

"FOUR!"

Altair seemed to bend over and touch his toes, and the next second was dangling from a thin stream of barrier script.

"THREE… Wow, that's neat…"

He swung his body, aiming for another bank of script, but as he released and grabbed at it, the script shifted and he fell right through it, looking like some weird caricature of a flying squirrel with his arms up and ready to cling and his legs out.

"TWO-ONE!" Rebecca shouted and her fingers clicked against a few keys—

And suddenly gravity shifted instantly ninety degrees to the left, and instead of standing on the ground, as they had been before, Desmond and Ezio found themselves five feet above it and falling, right along with Altair.

Vertigo overtook them both and they slammed together in a tangle of limbs and clothing, and about fifteen feet away Altair landed hard on his backside and slid almost as if he'd been riding a child's snow sled… He was in no way amused.

"There, X axis achieved. Now can we start?" Rebecca's voice was sweetly evil and they could hear Lucy sigh in a put upon way.

Altair was slowly climbing to his feet, looking dizzy and stiff, hands braced on his knees, and Ezio had rolled onto his back and was staring upward into the brightness. "Devil, she is Woman."

Desmond snorted in amusement and shook his head.

"Okay guys, pick a circle…"

A few meters away three glowing circles appeared on the loading screen floor, around which were little rotating dots.

Desmond climbed to his feet and dusted himself off simply because he felt the need to, and went to inspect these glowing circles. "This is new, what is it?"

"Shaun and I couldn't make the integration seamless on such short notice, so you've actually got to step into it to be loaded into the game. This way you can each rack up separate scores instead of one big one. Multiplayer mode rocks."

Desmond let his breath out in a sigh and rubbed the growing ache from the back of his skull, "Red, Blue and Yellow… Choose your poison."

"Poison?"

Desmond was willing to bet that was probably the first time Altair and Ezio had actually done something together, although he supposed speaking at the same time wasn't that great a feat, but he did prefer to be optimistic. He waggled a hand in the air like a seesaw; "It's not real poison, it's a figure of speech… Like telling someone to go lay an egg… You don't really mean for them to go and lay an egg."

Ezio perched his chin on forefinger and thumb and Altair cocked up an eyebrow.

Desmond rubbed his brow in frustration. "Just pick a circle."

After a moment they did, and as soon as both feet were inside the loading screen around them began to dissolve in little hexagonal spots spreading quickly outward from their feet, shapes appearing, colors darkening.

Altair's teeth appeared like a fence between his lips and his blade snapped out in alarm.

Ezio's hands were at the ready and he'd begun turning around and around watching, not liking at all that the world was dissolving and changing around them.

It was not a seamless transition, Rebecca had been right. As the world around them changed into that of the game, Desmond felt that slight pressure on the back of his neck increase, and his vision blurred. He bent, hands on his knees and closed his eyes, breathing deeply and letting his mind slip back a little to focus on his body, deliberately deepening his breath to hopefully ease the ache.

Ezio let out a startled cry, stealing Desmond's attention and when he carefully lifted his head and peered out he saw why.

Ezio had never really, honestly seen a modern city before. The sheer height and scale of the buildings he was now presented with, even in digital replication, was baffling. And the fact Altair was standing there with his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open staring up the face of what to Desmond looked like a replica of Thirty Rockefeller Center surrounded by a mash of Renaissance and Mediterranean style homes and villas… Well, to say the least, Desmond was not surprised by their utter outrage and repulsion by what they were seeing. He was also not at all surprised that all along the sides of the replica Thirty Rock, all the way to the very top, were glowing rings about the size of Frisbees.

"Oh, Jesus Christ… You've got to be fucking kidding me!" He lowered his head again, feeling nausea like a burning snake writhing around in his stomach.

Altair was still staring up at the monstrous building in revulsion but Ezio's attention had been drawn to something dark sitting on one of the flat 'turrets' of this gigantic castle…

It was a toad, not a frog. An enormous brown toad the size of a sofa with bulbous copper eyes and a helmet with a large red plume on it. It was wearing armor and a white surcoat with a red Croix on it… And seemed to have a pointy little white goatee as well…

So that was a Templar Frog… He thought it was fitting.

He also thought it was hilarious… And burst out laughing, doubled over holding his stomach—

And right before Desmond's eyes something miraculous happened.

Ezio's robes changed… One minute they were his plain blacks… The next they had lightened, elongated, and begun to change. His collar lifted and his visible armor changed, even his appearance seemed to change, his hair grew longer, a few thin streaks of gray through it, barely noticeable unless you were looking for it, spidery little lines formed at the edges of his eyes, and suddenly he wasn't childish looking in Master's robes, suddenly he looked older, standing there in his extravagant whites with the red trim, and—and…

And Altair had changed a little as well… While Ezio had seemed to age, Altair had done the opposite. He seemed to almost be swimming in his clothes. His limbs had thinned and he—dear God he made the most awkward looking teenager Desmond had ever seen.

"Wow, holy crap that was awesome!" Rebecca was chattering excitedly. "Did you see that!"

"Yes, I saw it, look at them, how could you not see it!" Shaun sounded almost afraid…Almost. Worried maybe, but never something as intensely emotional as _afraid_. "Now, why did it happen!"

Rebecca was still giggling and her chair squeaked as she leaned back; "The Animus is mental. It must be picking up on their subconscious, changing their appearance to fit their mental states and desires."

"Well, make it stop! God, in heaven, LOOK AT THEM!"

And Rebecca was looking. Ezio, in her opinion, looked good. Broader across the chest, more confident, more ready to fight… Altair looked scared enough to piss himself, and Desmond… Desmond didn't look good.

"Des? Hey, Des, are you alright?"

He didn't reply, just lifted a hand and gave her a rather pathetic looking thumbs up.

"Can we start now?" Ezio was rubbing his hands together, picking out the placement of a few of those glowing rings, as well as the Templar Frogs. This was probably the strangest madness he'd ever been presented with, but the absurdity of those FROGS was just too funny to pass up.

Altair gave his head a shake, turning to look at Ezio, and just as quickly as his own regression into a teenager had taken place, it reversed and he seemed to be himself again. He scowled severely. Hatefully even, and turned away from Ezio, spotting a grouping of a few rings hanging in space not far away. He didn't wait for Rebecca to say it was OK to go, didn't wait for anything, he just ran.

And Ezio gave a shout and started off as well; "CHEATER!"

It happened slowly at first… A strange twinge in his chest, a twinge almost like regret or sadness… The next second that feeling exploded into all out panic. Overwhelming, painful, breath stealing, mind blanking PANIC, because he could feel it now, and he understood why he'd felt so faint when Altair and Ezio had fought in the loading screen. Now he understood why he couldn't concentrate, why he felt so tired and… and thin.

"DON'T!" Desmond grabbed at the two sides of his head; "DON'T IT DIDN'T WORK!"

But it was too late.

Desmond had a brief mental image of three kids stretching a large elastic strip, one at each end, one in the middle. Smiling and laughing because it was so stretchy, taking steps farther and farther and farther apart, pulling and pulling and pu—

Until hands slip, and both ends of the strip come free and hurtle back toward the poor shmuck still holding the middle.

Rebecca must have had the same epiphany because Desmond saw the game dissolve quickly, just like it had come into being, only… only now the loading screen was different. The barrier script and clouds of binary were shifting, skipping, shot every so often with a digital shape, and he was reminded of how the TV acted up during a storm, how the picture was corrupt, bits and pieces missing and delayed because the signal was incomplete.

He doubled up, terror washing through his veins because now he could FEEL what had always happened to the TV, and it hurt beyond his imagining. It felt like he was being cut apart into tiny bite sized pieces.

Hands were on him, hands that were skipping and breaking apart like his own, and for the first time, looking into Altair's and Ezio's faces he saw the pain he felt.

"DESMOND!"

Someone was shouting his name, but the voice was distorted, robotic, heavily digitalized and flawed.

It was silent for a moment and then the voice was back, clearer, but he couldn't recognize it, only that it was female.

"Lay him down—LAY HIM DOWN! Don't touch him."

Ezio's face looked pained, as if breaking contact with the other man was pulling on his very soul. But he did as he was told, and lowered Desmond to the loading screen floor, scooting backward on his behind to sit a good nine feet away gripping his knees, horrified because every few seconds a hard, heavy JOLT would go through him as the world around them, and they themselves were rocked and scattered and pieced back together.

Through Lucy's headset they could hear what was happening. That Shaun had thrown his own headset aside and was beside the Animus, his voice was low, calm and somehow reassuring, and someone was retching. A helpless, quiet sound and they all knew instantly who it was and what was happening.

"Just stay still guys, relax, don't worry. Everything'll be OK in a minute." And her headset clicked as she took it off and lay it on the desk.

Desmond couldn't breathe, everything felt… felt, he wasn't sure how to name it, all he knew was that it hurt, it hurt and the base of his skull was most assuredly caved in from how horridly it hurt. He couldn't think, just laid there staring up into nothing, not really seeing or hearing or doing anything, just aware. So horribly and acutely aware that although the loading screen had accepted all three of them, they were not, in fact all three in there…

The more solid and real Altair and Ezio had become, the smaller Desmond had become in there with them.

Like a water balloon with all the water squeezed into one end and the other end was left deflated and empty.

When Altair and Ezio had taken off in opposite directions, they had been entirely themselves, but they had still just been water in the balloon of Desmond's mind, and although they went off on their own, Desmond had stayed still.

_We almost popped,_ Desmond chuckled, a high helpless, terrified sound. _We almost popped because we weren't loaded in as three people… We were just loaded in as one person with three peoples worth of memory…_

_The only way we're going to be able to separate is if we're all three loaded in as different people… _He shuddered. _But we're not… They're both in here with me, I can only be loaded in once because I've only got one brain… Oh, fuck, this isn't going to work. We're trapped like this._

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	5. Chapter 5

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_Experimenting with past and present tense. If it's irritating, I apologize. _

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**Chapter 5; The ****Hastings**** Secret**

Desmond was confined to his bed the second he Altair and Ezio came out of the Animus. They weren't even allowed to maneuver the body they were sharing. Shaun's face was pale and sweaty and his sweater was gone—Desmond had a feeling he'd probably gotten puke on it, so he remained silent and let the Brit give a quiet grunt of effort and carry him down the hall to the bedroom they shared.

Lucy appeared a few seconds after he'd been eased to the mattress and began a clinically disconnected exam. She took his pulse, checked his temperature and blood pressure, shined a little light into his eyes and made him swallow a rainbow assortment of pills.

No drugged milk this time. Just straight up sedative.

He didn't argue, what would the point be?

Desmond supposed everyone was surprised when Altair pushed forward to take control and flatly demanded to know what had happened. Desmond would have expected something like that from Ezio, but he wasn't used to Altair demanding and asserting his will.

Lucy sighed, her expression pained, and perched her hip on the edge of the bed. "It didn't work… Becca—Becca thinks that the only way we'll get all three of you in there completely, is if you're all three fully and totally aware as you're being loaded in… No sectioning off control. You all have to be in control of everything at once."

Altair swallowed thickly; "Why… Why did the machine break?"

Lucy's lips curled ever so slightly in sympathy; "It didn't break. Desmond just… His body—" She took a deep breath and for a second just gazed deeply into Desmond's face. It was so weird, but she could pick apart his expression as a whole and see all three of them individually. "He had a seizure… How you were loaded in taxed his mind and body too much and he went into convulsions."

"Is that why it did that… Is that why it began breaking apart?"

She lowered her face and nodded. "It should have kicked him out before it happened, but the two of you kept him synchronized." Her breath hitched and came out in a sigh; "Desmond's sync dropped, but yours and Ezio's were very high, and since you're sharing one mind, it wouldn't let Desmond out… If all three of you had been loaded in as different people then Desmond would have been able to desync and it wouldn't have bothered either of you, or vice versa."

Altair swallowed; "We hurt him…"

"He'll be OK though… but we can't take any more chances, so you have to stay in bed and rest…"

The little bit of Ezio she could see in his face looked instantly incredulous

"If something happens to Desmond, it happens to the two of you as well… You two are in his body. If he gets sick, it affects you. If he gets hurt it hurts you… If he's killed, you die too."

And a single expression melted into place over his features. Awareness of how fragile they were. The memories, cunning and strengths of three assassins crushed into one, but as fragile and helpless as a frail glass sculpture.

Lucy let out her pent up breath in a whoosh and took both of Desmond's hands, feeling Altair and Ezio instead. "Please, just do what I say this time. Please."

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Shaun wasn't very good company. Not when he was focused on his work that is.

Desmond found himself, this time, in control of his entire right side, which was very nice, but having his whole body to himself would have been much nicer. Ezio, after he and Altair had gotten into another argument and he'd ended up slapping the half of Desmond's face that was Altair hard enough to bruise, had been put on restriction or something like it. He was allowed to see, and hear and every so often allowed to speak, but he wasn't in any way shape or form allowed to move.

Ezio was sure he was in the lowest ring of hell now, and even said as much.

Altair was pretending not to listen and had built a kind of nest from blankets and pillows and effectively tucked Desmond in, adamant like a jailer and immovable like a brick wall.

Desmond didn't like that Altair kept meditating, kept focusing and focusing until he slowed down Desmond's heart and respiration, until it got to the point that Desmond realized it was utterly impossible for his body to go to sleep.

He would doze for a moment and Altair would be put in full control, Altair would doze and Ezio would spring forward and try to make another escape attempt. Only this time, he was mad enough to actually leave. Blizzard or no blizzard.

So, Altair would snap to and wrestle and fight for total control again and Desmond would be wrenched around for a while and that pressure on the base of his mind would start up, throbbing along each nerve and muscle and his fingers would go numb. By that time though Shaun would be on his feet beside the bed with wide eyes, asking over and over; "Is it another one? Hold on, I'll get Lucy—" And Altair would give Ezio a final hard shove and they would settle again… Only for the whole process to repeat.

There simply was no sleep. Their consciousnesses may doze off and slip back into the blackness, but there were no dreams, no rest, and his body was always awake, one of them having to constantly be in control.

No sleep…

And Shaun was no help at all… He was too quiet and when he did speak it was only to ask Altair something, his opinion on politics or religion or something of the like…

Ezio was getting irritated. "You are worse than Leonardo with your constant mind work… Always excited over the stupidest things. Smiling over puzzles, laughing over words on a page… Why think so much, all it does is make headaches and wars."

Shaun's expression became somehow flat and disapproving.

"Why are you so focused on things that happened years ago? It doesn't matter now. What matters is discovering how to beat these bastardos back! I was so close before, and now I learn centuries have gone by and we are still fighting them? Was all my work for naught? What was the point of fighting as I did… As WE did, if all you have done is let them regain their power and turn your own against you!"

Desmond could feel another headache building and he bowed his brow into his palm.

"The point is, Ezio, that they have very important Relics at their disposal. And it doesn't matter how physically strong you are, if your mind is weak these pieces can more easily corrupt and control you. We have very few pieces ourselves, fewer still that are of any particular use, and the ones we need haven't been seen in centuries. For all we know they may be myths themselves, or sitting right under our noses like a badly trimmed moustache. The point is; we won't be able to win against them as long as they have these things. We have to make them useless or find ones that cancel out their powers, but to do that, we need the three of you. More specifically, we need the three of you separated." He rubbed the bridge of his nose; "The Relics aren't just physical things you can hold in your hand… Some of them are much more valuable. Like your Second Sight. Over time that has evolved considerably… Have either of you tried accessing it through Desmond?"

Altair shifted uncomfortably and glanced off into the corner.

"The Intangible Eden Fragments are very special, very rare things, and in this room, right now there are two of them." He turned back to his computer, his mouth somehow grim looking pinched like that.

And Altair blinked; "What do you mean there are two of them?"

Shaun sighed in a put upon way and turned toward them, his expression rather dull; "Altair, you were told a few times that you were special, yes?"

His mouth compressed, but he did not confirm or deny it.

"Blood, dear dummies, is more valuable than any little trinket you can hide in your pocket." He gave a shiver and tugged his collar up higher.

Ezio didn't say another word, but the burning ache between his eyes told Desmond he wasn't at all happy about this.

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The next two days were nightmarish.

Moving, was traumatic. It happened in the middle of the night when Shaun was fully asleep in the bed across the room, snoring softly beneath his quilts, while Ezio was mumbling some story or another of something he'd seen, or done, or seen done, simply to pass the time. Altair had shut himself away hours ago to escape it… When suddenly the door creeked open and Lucy slipped in, fully dressed, coat and boots and everything, and shook Shaun awake.

"Time to move."

Ezio fell quiet, just watching with great interest as Shaun roused himself, sat listlessly on the edge of his bed for thirty seconds pouting and blinking and rubbing his eyes, then with a hefty sigh, stood and began packing in a quick, efficient and impartial way.

All the older man's things were folded and stuffed into his duffle, his computer in its case his glasses on, coat buttoned, shoes laced. Then he'd turned to the other side of the room with an expression better suited someone going to war. And systematically all of Desmond's things were folded into a backpack that made his lack of possessions all the more real, he was levered up, dressed, feet shoved into shoes, blankets and quilts swathed around him like swaddling clothes, and with one arm around Shaun's shoulder—Because the Brit refused to let him walk on his own—They shuffled out the door.

Lucy was already in the driver's seat of the car. An ugly older thing she must have stolen somewhere or gotten from one Assassin Sympathizer or another. There were dents and scratches and the fenders were a bit rusted, but it ran like a dream so its appearance could be over looked.

Bags went into the trunk and it was only then, standing there watching and holding the blankets and quilts close because he'd only just become aware of how fucking cold it was, that Desmond, Altair and Ezio noticed Rebecca was gone.

Lucy, recognizing that particular expression touched his shoulder; "She packed up the Animus last night and left shortly afterward."

Ezio still continued to pout about it, but he didn't say anything.

And then began the ugliest moments Desmond could truthfully say he had ever experienced.

Shaun helped him into the back of the car, stacking pillows against the driver's side door as a sort of bolster, and then climbed into the front beside Lucy.

Leaving the safe house was no problem. The problem occurred about five minutes afterward, bumping and sloshing and sliding and skidding through snow drifts, headlights practically blocked out by the downpour of snow. Heater blaring making everything smell slightly of Shaun's wool coat, dampened by the precipitation, the windows fogging up, cheesy Christmas music playing on the radio…

And at about the same time, give or take a few seconds, Altair and Ezio became considerably carsick. Desmond knew simply because he experienced a sudden, and violent stab of vertigo and his stomach did a complicated little flip into his throat.

Altair and Ezio, however, were both too proud to admit they feel ill, so that left Desmond, who had never really experienced carsickness in his life, aside from the brief nausea he'd felt riding in the trunk of Lucy's car all that time ago.

"Guys I—" He swallowed with a measure of difficulty; "I'm feelin' kinda sick."

Shaun poked a hand into his pocket and fished about for a moment then produced a black zipping case not much different from one of those agenda notebooks you see every so often in the store. But inside, instead of a notebook and possibly a calculator, there was an array of prescription bottles.

Desmond recognized a few labels. Pain medication, vitamins, antibiotics. There are two bottles though that he didn't recognize, and one more he found himself soon becoming quite good friends with seeing as he recognizes those orange block letters; _'Dramamine'._

Shaun handed him a few of the little pills, chewables, why was he not surprised.

But Desmond was in no mood to argue that he was a big boy and could swallow fucking pills like an adult, he just hastily crunched them up and swallowed without protest. After a few seconds he slouched miserably and threw an arm up over his eyes, trying to ignore the hellish jostle and shifting of lateral movement, wishing he could shrink into nothing in this makeshift bed he's found himself prisoner in.

Twenty-five minutes later Ezio wasn't car sick anymore, and had taken it upon himself to memorize the chorus in the songs playing on the radio and sing along… loudly, when he can.

Altair though, Desmond is willing to bet, has been dry heaving back in that little corner he's retreated to non stop since they left the safehouse.

Desmond wasn't normally a very sentimental person, nor was he very aware of how things must appear to the outside world. He was unfortunately, one of those men whose main philosophy on life goes something like this; 'If it smells good, eat it, if it itches, scratch it, if it needs it, pick it, and if you want to, pull it' Simple as that… So when he started to picture in his head, how insane he must look and sound, switching between voices and facial expressions, getting into physical fights with himself and generally acting like a lunatic— and actually was able to visualize what an outsider must see, he decided that if anyone asked, he would just smile, and pretend to be moderately Autistic. Because convincing someone he was handicap would be easier that trying to explain he had two other men living in his head.

"Shaun?" Lucy said quietly, but she didn't look away from the road. "Have you taken your medicine?"

He hissed between his teeth and widened his eyes behind his glasses in warning. "Not now."

Ezio picked up on it, like he picks up on everything, and filed it away for later use and consideration.

Altair surfaced about then, only long enough to make Desmond feel mildly nauseous again, then he slunk back like a kicked dog to sulk in his corner.

Desmond snorted at the mental image he had, and didn't realize until after it's already come out of his mouth, but Ezio had stopped singing and was watching the snow fly past the windows.

"You really do go cry in corners, just like Malik said."

And heat flooded Desmond's mind, centralizing somewhere far back where he knows Altair has been hiding, near his left eardrum, and for half a breath he feels Altair within his consciousness. Feels it just like he had when he and Ezio had bled together so violently, he is aware of Altair's every thought and feeling and memory as if it were his own. But instead of those memories and his own clapping together, instead there is only that heat, burning and painful and filled with desperate sadness.

In that moment Desmond found himself witnessing something he'd never seen in the Animus, never even considered by watching the two interact… He saw Malik asleep, naked and content to be so shamelessly dozing. He saw Malik looming over him, close—DEEP—and so open. And then everything shifted, passes on down through genetics and he's attending a small, hasty funeral… Saw snow and ice and a cold, rocky frozen grave—

And Shaun had produced a bucket from somewhere, the bastard probably had it stowed away because he knew this would happen. Like he's fucking psychic or something, and Desmond is being uncontrollably ill.

Ezio has shrunk back a little, just a buzzing presence behind his eyes, and Altair is a hot, burning liquid fire sensation where his brain ends, like he's back there stabbing Desmond's spinal cord trying to send him into seizures again.

Lucy's still driving, the radio's still playing, and the world is still moving.

Desmond came to the abrupt conclusion that this was all just some horrid, twisted dream, and when he woke up he was going to tell everyone how crazy it was and enjoy their laughter at his expense.

Eventually the sickness ebbs and Desmond is left with the lingering stench of wet wool and bile, for a moment he tolerates it, but that moment is burned away by whatever Altair has set fire to in his head, because the next second Desmond is crying and all he can do is visualize that grave and KNOW and it hurts more than anything. It hurts because that memory wasn't Altair's at all, that memory was his son's, and the boy didn't just see a funeral, he saw something in Altair break. And if Desmond knew one thing, it was that seeing something so profound, something so emotional that you have experienced, also played out on your face makes it ten times harder to bear, and sometimes, it simply makes it unbearable, and you have to block it out, have to shove it down and away from yourself so you can continue to function… Sometimes you have to hide because it won't stay stuffed down, it festers and swells and comes to a disgusting, infected head like a boil, and the only way to deal with it is to lance it and let the pus run out.

That kind of trauma hollows you out until there's nothing left but the hurt, the sorrow and outrage and it consumes you body and soul.

Desmond cries for a long time, so long, in fact, that he doesn't notice when Shaun has crawled into the back with him and the Brit has pulled him close, offering the solidity of his chest and the warmth in his embrace.

It feels so peculiar at first, but then, as Altair shoves himself forward, and Ezio inches closer hovering in the back so he can see and feel it himself, and Desmond can picture him in his head standing there with his arms crossed, feigning irritation because he's too proud to admit he needs a hug, when Desmond realizes that letting Shaun hold him like this isn't bad, the tears ease up and he grows quiet, for a while just focusing on the contact and nothing else.

"It's almost over," Shaun said, his voice hushed, secret almost. "We'll figure it out. I promise."

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There is a difference, Desmond decides, between insomnia and a complete and total inability to sleep.

Insomnia is irritating. It's hell sometimes too, not being able to sleep and when you do gaining no relief from it.

Not being able to sleep at all, well… It plays with your mind. It makes the strangest things absolutely intolerable. It makes life in general, intolerable… Not being able to sleep, can drive you perfectly, and simply insane.

Desmond knows this very well because those two days it takes to get to the new Safehouse, he Altair and Ezio are perfectly awake. Every minute, every second ticks by with agonizing slowness.

Shaun stays up with them for a while, until his eyelids droop and he starts rubbing at his chest, dark circles forming under his eyes. Lucy, who has woken up to do a quick check of the Hotel perimeter, takes one look at Shaun and points to the bed she's so recently left.

Shaun wrinkles his nose and opens his mouth to protest, but Lucy's hands go to her hips and she glares at him with twice the intensity he's able to muster. "Go to sleep, Shaun." She says. "You're still recovering yourself. I can't risk checking you into the hospital because your immune system has gone into the red again."

Shaun blanches and his eyes fill with flames, but he listens to her, though Desmond doesn't know why, and a few seconds later Shaun is shuffling out of the bathroom in his underwear and an ugly cable knit green sweater… But instead of taking Lucy's bed, he lifts the blankets and slides under right beside Desmond.

Ezio is instantly insulted and tries to roll away, but Altair growls audibly and wrenches back control. Desmond is too tired to protest and just lets it all happen because he's pretty sure his brain is rotting from the inside out and sooner or later he'll just drop over dead from exhaustion.

"You should try to sleep." Shaun says.

"I'll slip into a coma and die, Shaun… No thanks."

The older man yawns and Desmond can see down his throat, see a space where one of Shaun's molars is missing and he finds that somehow amusing.

"I won't let you slip into a coma." Shaun tucks an arm under his head and rubs his cheek on the pillow. "Now, try to sleep… All of you." Then as an afterthought, he cracks open one eye and his gaze pierces right past Desmond and Altair and pins Ezio to the preverbal wall. "And as for you… Don't even think about trying to escape. I'm a very light sleeper."

Ezio scoffs derisively.

Desmond feels himself sinking back into the darkness, it's hellish, but at least he doesn't have to think back here if he can keep from it. A moment or two later he feels Altair near him, still angry and hurt, but no longer trying to poke and prod and yank on his nerves trying to make him seize.

Altair feels somehow resolute, as if perhaps he's given up on some battle or another and for a moment Desmond worries Ezio's gotten control and is running amuck but he can't make himself care.

It's like gravity, he supposes, why he and Altair somehow end up pressed together. Strange how he can feel the other, fuzzy around the edges, feathery… It's stranger still how he can feel himself, feel the very boundaries of everything that makes him who he is, how these feathery edges of himself and Altair move and shift and twist together, but come so effortlessly back apart, swirling and swishing and feeling one another, but never truly meshing…

Desmond muses that in all actuality everything that he is must look something like one of those cushions he remembers seeing in Altair's memories. One of the ones with the fringe on it that Malik kept in a pile in the Bureau. He wonders what would happen if he Altair and Ezio were to… to stack themselves like those cushions, like panes of glass in a window, and move forward at the same time…

He chuckles to himself, envisioning it. Picturing puzzle pieces that were the same shape stacked together all fitting into the same hole…

_It would work then… We would all be ourselves at one time._

But he's too tired to be excited about it and although his muted enthusiasm travels like ripples in a fountain through himself and into Altair, neither of them can muster the strength to shoot forward and announce that they've figured out how to fix it all. They just hang there in the darkness and exchange ripples of emotion for a while, feeling a little less hopeless themselves as they tried to comfort the other.

Desmond imagines he can hear Altair's voice with each little wave that travels through him. Imagines he can hear the sorrow and regret in it, but as well a growing sense of understanding.

_There is no way out of this hell but the road we make for ourselves. _

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Desmond floats to the surface as Ezio sinks back, too exhausted to retain control, and like clockwork he finds himself aware again, no less tired, but a little more emotionally stable to deal with it.

Shaun is asleep, and Desmond is curled up in the older man's arms with his face pressed into the hollow of the historian's throat.

Lucy is awake, sitting on the edge of her bed putting on her boots, and Desmond can't quite place where he's encountered that spicy scent coming from Shaun's skin before. He shifts his nose closer curiously and feels a stripe of scar tissue against his chin.

Carefully, slowly, hoping Lucy thinks he's lightly comatose and his movement doesn't wake Shaun, Desmond peers down, finding himself entranced with the man's shirt collar. He's never really been interested in it before. Why would he be? Shaun's shirt collar seemed to embody everything he was and stood for. He kept it buttoned and high and never exposed the vulnerable plain of his chest, just his throat, as if daring anyone to try it… But now this dip in the fabric is the center of Desmond's universe because Shaun's t-shirt and sweater have stretched a little with the movement of sleep and he can see a wedge of the Brit's chest.

He's not surprised to encounter some brownish red hair, he always figured Shaun would be a little hairy, the man had to shave every day and by five that evening he looked like he hadn't even bothered, unlike Desmond, who it had taken two weeks to grow any facial hair noticeable enough to be annoying to his teammates. But what does surprise Desmond is that scar. Faintly pink, a few years old at least, bisecting Shaun's chest—

He's seen a few scars like it in his lifetime. Usually older people. A woman he worked with had one, the result of a triple bypass. That scar made him think of heart attacks and smoker's coughs and old people keeling over in the street. He didn't know what to think about Shaun having one. It didn't quite make sense to him.

Of course, at that moment, nothing made sense to him.

Desmond lets his eyes fall shut again and for a while he just seems to hang there, pretending to be dead, screaming silently for sleep that just won't come.

Lucy nudges Shaun awake and bends close to whisper in his ear; "I think you actually did it… I think he's sleeping."

Shaun roused fitfully, grumbling and pulling Desmond closer like a teddy bear for a moment before with a grunt and a growl he comes fully awake and glares up at Lucy through squinted, unfocused eyes; "What?"

She puts a finger to her lips and points down at Desmond.

Shaun glares at him and for a seconds goes tense as if about to shove the younger man away, but his breath comes out in a huff and he pats at Desmond's hair irritably; "Needs a cut and a shave… Nearly itched me to death last night." He gives a gentle, playful tug at the hairs on Desmond's chin and slides carefully out of the bed. He sits there and yawns and stretches and scratches for a bit before he stands, stretching his arms over his head and as discretely as possible, adjusts himself as he toddles toward the bathroom.

Lucy sits in the spot Shaun has just vacated and runs her fingers through Desmond's hair. "Thanks for that," She whispers, "He needs to feel useful or else he might decide not to come back."

Desmond doesn't answer her, just continues to feign sleep so he doesn't know if she was aware that he was still conscious or not, he decides to forget she said anything, it'll be easier that way… Although he is curious as to where Shaun may be going, from which he might not return.

Lucy continues to finger comb his hair and she hums in concern noticing how much comes out into her palm. "Your system's all outta whack…" She inhales deeply and leans close to press her lips to his temple. "I think you're a little fevered too…" A sigh; "Don't worry, Des… We'll get them out and everything'll be OK again. I promise… The new safehouse is nice, wait till you see it… I think you'll really like it."

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	6. Chapter 6

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_Dear Ubisoft,_

_I reject your reality and substitute my own._

_Love,_

_OZ_

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**Chapter 6; The Almighty Id**

Desmond didn't open his eyes at all. He let himself whine and grumble sleepily as Shaun picked him up again. Crinkled his brow and growled that he wasn't an invalid he could walk just fine on his own, then leaned his head against the Brit's shoulder and gripped the front of his shirt.

He'd pick his battles this time. At least Shaun wasn't saying he was lazy anymore.

And it really wasn't until the cold, thin air splashed over him as they left the hotel—wasn't until he was already being pushed bodily into the uncomfortable back seat of the car that Desmond really became curious as to where they were going.

He continued to feign sleep for a while longer, long enough that either Altair or Ezio slunk forward enough to feel like a dull throb behind his eyes. And it was then that he pried his lids apart and peeked out at the world from beneath his cocoon of blankets.

It was utterly dark outside and every so often they passed a road sign that was not in Italian, or German or Swedish.

_Where the hell are we?_

A hand appeared, groping at his cozy coverings, pulling them away from his face, and Desmond flinched a little, not expecting it.

Shaun was grinning. And not the kind of grin that came over his face when he was thinking of something rather unpleasant to say. It wasn't one of those pleased with himself, sarcastic grins. This was an honest… crooked, cheeks unshaven, eyes still glazed from sleep, happy little grin.

"Des," He said, voice low so as not to disturb Lucy's driving. "Turn 'round and have a look."

He felt his brows drawing down but he made himself turn, mostly because he didn't know what Shaun was talking about, it was dark, there was nothing to look… at.

The sun was peeking up over the horizon. The sky looking a glacial pink that faded into black above his head. The snow had stopped and everything twinkled like diamonds across the jagged mountain tops.

"We're about to pass intoFrance."

"France? Why are we going toFrance?" His voice sounded cracked and thin.

Lucy cleared her throat; "We're going toFranceto be closer to the Blanks, Desmond."

"Why?" He shifted uncomfortably; "And what are the blanks anyway? They're—they're not…" His voice tapered off, throat feeling constricted at the mere thought.

Lucy swallowed thickly; "Like I said before… The Templars tried more than once to clone you…"

"So," He ground his teeth, tightening his fingers on his forearms to keep his voice steady; "So there are more of—more of me out there?"

Shaun interjected before Lucy could say anything else; "They aren't you… They are just genetic replicas. No brain function, no will or thought—"

"—No souls—" Desmond spat it, feeling ugly and spiteful and inhuman all over again. "What the fuck is a soul anyway? It's nothing… All we are—all anybody is, is just a bunch of memories and chemical reactions." He swallowed with some difficulty and made himself continue, even though his voice cracked; "Altair was right, wasn't he… There isn't anything. It's just now, just this, that's all we'll ever get and when we die we're just gone. There is no purpose to this. It's all futile, nothing we do matters, so what's the point of trying to fight anymore it will NEVER make a differen—" And his left hand came up and smacked right across his lips so hard his teeth hurt and his skin tingled unpleasantly.

He wasn't sure who did it, Ezio or Altair or maybe he'd done it to himself subconsciously, he didn't know, but whatever, or whoever had done it silenced him and he felt tears pricking his eyes yet again.

Shaun was scowling, more severely than Desmond could ever remember and the words that came out of his mouth next were something shocking.

"That's a bit dramatic, don't you think?" He pursed his lips and shifted a little more so his back didn't ache as much turned as he was to look the other man in the face; "I don't know about Lucy, but I myself, have done extensive research both into religion and science. And it is cold, hard fact, Desmond, that there are some things in this world that are too perfect, too unique, to chalk up as just wild chance. I believe there is something—What, I don't know, am not really in a great hurry to find out actually, just knowing something's there is a comfort— But at the same time I disagree completely with the religious explanation of what this is. I really don't support their theory of god. There are too many contradictions, too many political facets for my liking… Just as with science, we don't have the ability to see the whole picture, just what we've got in front of us at this moment. I don't believe in some omnipotent God King that sits on a gilded throne in the heavens and condemns his creations that don't fall into a social and economical mold to burn in eternal hell fire. I think that is a complete and total load actually. But that isn't to say I don't believe in a higher power. And I find it rather dismally unoriginal of you to howl and cry and sob because you're unable to cope with the idea that there are some things too terribly complicated for you to understand."

"What isn't there to understand? There are more of me out there that are just empty sacks of meat and water without a soul! I was like that until they put memories in my head!" He poked his temple rather hard with a rigid finger; "They did this! This isn't me, it's not real! _I'M_ NOT REAL! It's not true! Everything I remember is a LIE, everything I've ever felt is because of memories that aren't even mine! I'm a COPY! I'm a soulless imitation. I'm just a lab rat, Shaun, some science experiment that has outlived its usefulness! W-what would happen if I just poofed away, huh? Would it make any difference? Or would everything I am just evaporate because I wasn't BORN! Am I even human or am I just some fucking THING with no rights and no privileges like a stray dog? Will any of us be human? What does that even MEAN!"

Shaun's scowl deepened and a thick wrinkle formed between his brows; "It means, you great moldering pillock, that your definition of 'soul' is bullshit and you should stop acting like an over emotional tween and LOOK at what's happening to you now." He had become a little red in the face and his hands were shaking, nails biting into the back of Lucy's seat as he tried to keep himself in that unnatural twisted position so he could look into Desmond's eyes as he spoke.

"Shaun, you're not helping him." Lucy said from the corner of her mouth.

He ignored her completely; "It takes more than memories and chemical reactions to make a person, Desmond… And you would not be here, talking to me and feeling what you are in your chest if there wasn't SOMETHING in there that is not biological. If there were not something in there that could not be explained by science you would still be a lifeless breathing corpse! You are who you are because of that Spark, you are truly and brutally alive because of it! It is everything that holds your memories and your emotions together. The computer disk that made your pea sized brain start to function couldn't make you love, Desmond. That is something pure and wholly unique. That something can't be explained by science or your pathetic views of self. It's the very thing that puts that crooked, shit-eating grin on your face, it's the thing that puts the light in your eyes and the pain in your chest. And it's that very same thing that makes you and ONLY you shine in the edges of my vision when I look at you… THAT is your soul and I will not have you blasting on and on about how inhuman you are just because you weren't brought into this world traditionally. You're a narrow minded fool and I won't stand for it a moment longer!" He turned back around in his seat and gave the radio knob a harsh twist, filling the air inside the car with rather loud, distance distorted French Christmas music.

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The French Boarder Station was very remote, small with just a handful of young guards in crisp uniforms and thick coats.

Lucy did the talking while Shaun smiled as politely as he could and watched the men walk around the car with a drug sniffing dog, as well as a bomb sniffing dog.

The man Lucy was talking to asked about Desmond curled in the back seat, and Lucy said with a sigh that he was just sleepy and suffering from a cold as she produced three happily worn looking passports with various stamps from a rainbow assortment of countries.

The man looked at them and compared the faces in pictures to the ones in the car and pecked on Desmond's window to get his attention.

Passports stamped and a wave from the man in charge, and off they went intoFrance.

Desmond felt a little giddy at the idea that they'd passed by without incident, as plainly and regularly as they pleased, peering back out the window at the men he let his sight slip, relieved when there was absolutely no red in his field of vision. He slumped against the car seat and when the pressure at the back of his eyes became a little more insistent he let himself fall backward.

Time, he'd come to realize, was warped when you were back there in the darkness. He was aware of it passing, but how much time wasn't always certain. What felt like an hour could only be a few minutes, or what felt like a few minutes could be days. All three of them being close to the front at the same time, sharing his body like that, and time slowed to a crawl. Maybe it was easier to just take turns like this… Even if it was horrifying.

He found himself back there again with Altair, just floating around and every so often he could feel their edges brush together.

For a while he was just angry and tired… But the more he thought about what Shaun had said the more he started to think about what he felt back here. What if, this soft edged feeling, like the fringe on a cushion, what if this rounded small feeling was, in fact, his soul? What if that is what he can feel himself brushing up against. Was he really, and could he actually be touching his ancestor's soul?

He thought for a moment and then tried… tried reaching out with those soft fringes of himself… and felt Altair reaching hesitantly back.

It was a little frightening actually… like an intense, but almost pleasurable tingle. _Warm… safe… loved._

Ezio, where he was in control, huddled and shivering in Desmond's blankets, felt it. He gave a hard shudder and a gasp, hands going over his chest, eyes squeezed closed because of the force of it.

He'd felt something similar once before, he couldn't remember where, or when, or why, but he could remember it so plainly, so perfectly at that moment it brought tears to his eyes. He likened it to the sensation one felt when a small, plump fuzzy kitten was held to one's breast. A soft, warm, alive feeling. Something fragile, an awareness of that fragility, but an unbreakable strength as well…

Shaun turned in his seat and was staring at him, he said something to the blonde woman and she glanced over her shoulders a few times before pulling off to the side of the road and turning in her seat, hands searching and pulling at the blankets… But—Ezio didn't care. He was overwhelmed by this strange, familiar sensation…

Desmond was a little startled when he felt Ezio come sinking back with them, felt himself and Altair rising to meet him.

It was so curious, just letting themselves bump and brush together. Like children with wide eyes and shivers of delight using the tips of their fingers to touch a fish, or a bird or something of the like. Some otherworldly creature that was presented to them.

They seemed to fit together so perfectly, like the way bowls fit together when stacked… Floating there, undisturbed breathing as one, ripples of emotion flowing back and forth, strange glowing colors flashing behind their eyes.

Desmond imagined he could hear the others talking, could hear Altair grumbling in irritation at being disturbed, Ezio chuckling and calling him a cranky old man, then making a comment so full of innuendo and sass about the fact Altair found himself in the middle of their little 'cuddle session'.

Altair would writhe indignantly but wouldn't 'sink to Ezio's level' to make a retort.

A few moments later, curiosity sated, they drifted apart, Altair back to his corner, Ezio back toward the front, and for a moment Desmond just floated there, thinking, wondering if it was time… Should he tell Lucy and Shaun what they'd discovered? Should he tell them that he and Altair had figured it out? That just now they'd tried it, and the notion of stacking themselves was possible?

He moved without even consciously making a decision and let himself rise to the surface…

Had he been paying more attention to the outside world, he would have known something was wrong, something was different, but he was too busy, too happy to think clearly, and when he rose to the surface his first and only thought was; 'why is it so hot?' And then it all melted away.

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Rebecca had her Baby set up in the new hideout within four hours of arriving. In the five hours since she'd had time to make a few adjustments and sit down to do some thinking.

When they'd tried to load Desmond, Altair and Ezio days before she'd assumed, that since all three of them had been in the loading screen, that they had all been there. But looking back on it, she knew that hadn't been true at all. She pictured the Animus as a cookie cutter. And Altair, Ezio and Desmond as different colors of dough. Individually they could fit perfectly, and without incident into the space provided. Trying to put all three in at once meant they had to squeeze in like pie pieces, through the ring she could see all three of them clearly, but outside it they were still present and would be cut apart, so while they had all been inside Baby, they had also only been partially loaded. And while inside they'd been able to move around, but there was only so much room, so each time one of them moved one of the others was pressed farther out, but never completely.

You can divide something infinitely and there would always be just a little bit of it there, even if you couldn't see it…

"That's exactly what happened to them," She said to herself, looking down at the equations she'd been working with. "They kept pushing and pushing and pushing Desmond out, but they couldn't push him out completely, because that fraction of him that was in there, also meant there was a fraction of them OUTSIDE…" She tapped her head with her pencil and continued writing.

Was there a way to get all of them in at once?

She went back to her cookie cutter, thinking about it in the simplest ways possible… and realized the cookie cutter wasn't exactly the perfect metaphor. Their weight alone wouldn't be enough to get them through all at once, they would need a little help… something to draw them in… But what?

A pull? Suction?

Fine, she could do that… But there was only so much room, they would be smashed together, so once they were forced in how would she be able to get them back apart?

There was no 'undo' button on this… Once they started bleeding together, how was she going to get them apart?

What could she change about the current algorithm that would ensure they stayed far apart, even though they were being pulled together like matter toward a black hole?

They need a push… Something to try and push them out again… They needed to find that perfect balance between the X axis and the Y axis…

She cradled her head in her hands and let out a sigh.

To get them back apart again, she'd have to make them fly… but how?

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Shaun Hastings was not inherently a cruel man. But he felt like one sometimes, especially now.

They'd reached the new safe house without incident. No one following them, trail covered by the renewed downpour of snow. The French Countryside could be quite sympathetic it seemed, because the house, though a standing relic from the First World War, seemed to be in rather good shape. The roof didn't leak, the foundation wasn't crumbling, and although ancient, there was functioning indoor plumbing.

Shaun relished in the fact he could use an actual toilet again, and promised himself an hour of leisure time to do just that.

But, there were more pressing matters to attend to. Most urgent of which was the fact that Desmond was fevered, only semi-conscious, and seemed to be experiencing a rather violent bleed. He kept looking at Shaun with those glazed eyes and speaking in perfect Italian, smiling and reaching up to every so often brush knuckles gently against his cheek.

Rebecca had been oh so helpful in translating, saying that Ezio was reliving an unfortunate bout of illness during which he was cared for by—And Shaun just LOVED this—A woman with red hair and a sour disposition.

Shaun vowed never to let Ezio, or Desmond for that matter, live this down.

Lucy was worried as well, pacing back and forth while she waited until Ezio stilled long enough that she could convince him that holding this little glass thing under his tongue would make him feel better.

Ezio though, was not so easily convinced. Had his consciousness not been absorbed in his memories at the moment, he would have been more rational and probably wouldn't have fussed as much, but as it was, he wasn't all together there. And the little parts of Desmond that came through, the scowls and grumbling, asking Shaun just what the hell he thought he was doing so close, and why were the walls shimmering like that, those weren't helpful either, because the fever Ezio had conjured up from his memories, was very real even though the cause was not, and it was becoming apparent quickly that before Desmond could take full control of himself again, Ezio's little 'play' had to be acted out.

Ezio was a very tenacious bastard sometimes, and he absolutely refused to be ignored.

It wasn't that Shaun exactly minded letting Desmond—or in this case Ezio—cling to him while he rested. What he did have a problem with was the fact that Ezio thought he was a woman and every so often commented that he had very nice breasts, or that he shouldn't be ashamed of feeling so curious of a man's body.

Shaun tolerated it until Ezio decided he wanted to_ feel_ Shaun's lovely breasts, and the tent in his sweats came a little too close to the Brit's thigh for his liking.

"That's it." He gave the other man a hard shove and yanked the blankets back.

Ezio curled in on himself startled, complaining about the chill and that he didn't understand. What was the matter?

Shaun leveled a finger in the other man's face. "I am not a woman you randy old git! And if I was I certainly wouldn't succumb to such tasteless groping and leg humping!"

Ezio's eyes were wide and shocked, his brows scrunched and he looked plainly confused and unhappy; _"I'm sorry, I didn't know you were a virgin…"_

Rebecca cackled where she was sitting at the other end of the room going through equations and code on her laptop.

Shaun whirled and glared at her; "What'd he say?" He turned and bared his teeth at Ezio; "I don't know what you just said, but that's enough of it! No more! I won't have it!"

_"I will make it very good, I promise. It will feel so very good."_

Rebecca was collapsed over her desk shaking with silent laughter.

No, Shaun Hastings was not an inherently cruel man, but he did feel like one. Grabbing Ezio by the collar of his shirt and dragging him spluttering and twisting into the kitchen and shoving his head under the cold sink tap.

Ezio, thrashed and spluttered and slapped at him, trying to wriggle away, but Shaun held him still, knowing the position looked awkward, but not being able to stand the other's sex talk for a moment longer.

The cold water running in his ears seemed to be the thing that did it. Because Ezio howled and stomped hard on Shaun's instep, jerking away shaking his head and wringing a finger in each ear violently, cursing and stomping and hissing.

_Who'd have thunk it._ The great Ezio Auditore had been very prone to ear infections as a child, ear infections that had left him with a horrible and incurable fear of having water in his ears.

Altair, who had been hiding in the very back of Desmond's mind inched forward at the commotion. He hadn't known what was going on, that Ezio had made them sick, or that Desmond had been stuck there, caught in the fever and unable to differentiate reality from a Bleed and was just floating there off to the side, upside down in his own little dream world.

Altair, having been at the back of Desmond's mind hadn't really been aware of anything that was going on. He'd been too absorbed in his own mental process and dilemmas. Now that he _was_ aware of the chaos, aware of the fever coursing through their veins, he didn't really know what to do or how to fix it, and the fact Ezio was going a little crazy stabbing a finger in his ear trying to get the fluid out, really didn't make the situation any better. So, he just hurtled straight for the Italian like a bowling ball and grappled with him for control.

He pictured Ezio, for some reason, like an angry cat. Clinging and scratching and pulling until he bled. And the more he shook, trying to get the other man away, the harder Ezio clung to him.

At least now though, he'd been pulled away from his memories.

Shaun just stood there over Desmond as he rocked and shook and finally settled himself back into control while Altair and Ezio had it out in the back of his mind like raccoons fighting over a dirty diaper.

Desmond just sat there for a long while with his hands pressed flat over his ears, and his face scrunched in pain. Bent over his knees and rocking back and forth like a traumatized child.

Shaun felt so cruel, so inhuman just standing there and watching, knowing but not understanding what the younger man was going through. He eased into a crouch in front of him and carefully, warily, formed his hand to the top of the other's head, combing fingers through dripping, shaggy hair.

It was then that he truly understood what kind of toll this had all taken on Desmond.

Forget being a clone of a man who'd gone quite insane and killed himself, forget about being sick and slowly dieing from exhaustion.

Desmond had been forced to sacrifice himself body, mind and soul in the name of a cause he didn't really believe in… And he'd done it completely against his will, but with a smile on his face.

Shaun wanted to see that smile again very badly. As much as he'd teased and tortured and snapped, tried to make himself believe the other was just a chunk of meat and chemical reactions, the breakdown in the car earlier that morning had been a turning point because he couldn't keep fooling himself anymore…

He duck walked forward, easing his behind onto the floor and pulled the younger man tight against his chest, ignoring the fact Lucy and Rebecca had followed them into the kitchen and were standing there watching him with wide eyes.

"It's horrible." Shaun whispered easing back to sit against the wall and grip Desmond as if his life depended on it. "I know that… It hurts and you shouldn't have to deal with it. And I'm sorry that you do… No one should have to go through what you are." He took a deep breath and worked his fingers at a tense knot between the younger man's shoulders. "When this is over, when you're all to yourselves, I promise —And this is something monumental because I never promise anything—I promise, I will make it up to you. Even if I have to dress in drag and do a hula for your entertainment, I will find some way to make all this ugliness worth it."

Desmond scoffed and rubbed his face in the older man's sweater.

Nothing could make this horror worth it.

Nothing.

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_Just so you know, my Italian is shit at best so enjoy Italics Italian._

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	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7; God of the Little Men**

It was an old house. The kind of house Shaun remembered his grandmother having.

She'd been a loony little dried up old thing when he'd been just a child. Still scuttling around in her nurses' white heels and calf length pleated skirts with her stockings wrinkled and bunched about her ankles. Often using her zimmer frame as a battering ram. She'd had an affinity for crocheted blankets and cardigans… He supposed he had gotten something from that side of the family after all, other than a peanut allergy anyway. What luck.

Granny Hastings had lived in a blockish two-story and owned rigid lumpy furniture she decorated with doilies and her crocheted blankets.

The living quarters of their new hideout reminded him, quite keenly, of his grandmother's. The furniture had the same unforgiving lumpy like a parboiled yam appearance. And he could just remember sitting there on the edge of the sofa cushion rubbing the bruises on his knees and tapping the toes of his polished school shoes together while Granny Hastings had prattled on and on about how the whole world was going to hell in a hand basket because of rock and roll music and those damnable rockets they kept poking holes in the ozone layer with.

She also had liked to smack Shaun about the back of his thighs with the decorative willow cane she carried with her to Sunday Morning Services, when he walked with a slouch or let his shoes become untied, or when she happened to catch him with his school jacket tied like a bundle around peaches or apples he'd stolen from the farm in town when he should have been in school. By his sixth year he had decided the only way to please her was to replace his brain with a computer hard drive, and invent a shoelace that never came out of its symmetrical bow and always kept your shoes tight to your feet. He had a feeling it would involve elastics and peanut oil… Damned peanuts.

He had also had a sneaking suspicion that it would take an act of Parliament and perhaps even a decree from the Queen herself to make his grandmother stop yanking up the back of his pants in public and telling him to tuck in his shirt. Or wiping imaginary dirt from his face with a spit wetted fingertip.

The new hideout made him very aware of how tight his collar was and that, had she still been alive, Granny Hastings would have been appalled by how low his slacks rode on his hips, and perfectly offended that he didn't wear those knee length cotton underpants she had forced on him as a child. Yes, she would be perfectly offended that sometimes—sometimes—he liked to slide his body into a pair of thin lace bikinis and feel them so tight and silky against his skin during the day.

He found the couch the most unsettling thing he'd ever seen. A rusty orange color with a pattern of faded flowers over it, a ruffled dust skirt tufted cushions and a hideous olive green, brown and orange crocheted blanket over the back.

Shaun wanted to burn the damned thing and dance around it naked, but he settled on scowling at it instead.

Especially since Desmond had taken up residence on it and absolutely refused to move.

Poor bastard…

He hadn't spoken since regaining himself in the kitchen earlier. And although his fever had broken his eyes had not refocused and he just stared into nothing about three feet away from him with his hands settled limply in his lap and his expression so utterly empty Shaun was afraid the muscles there had begun to atrophy.

Every so often he walked over with his arms crossed and nudged Desmond until the younger man shifted away, just to make sure the idiot hadn't become catatonic.

Desmond didn't say a word for over six hours and when he did speak, Shaun wished dearly that he hadn't.

He looked up, eyes empty and confused, a crinkle between his brows; "Who am I?"

Shaun's blood ran cold and he dropped into a crouch before the other man and gathered both of those cold hands between his own; "You're Desmond."

He looked up with such a startled, wounded expression on his face it caused Shaun physical pain.

"I… I don't remember what my mom looked like." He swallowed his voice rising in pitch; "D-do I have a mother?"

It was very painful to speak all of the sudden; "Yes, of course you do."

His voice continued to rise and he'd begun to lean forward into Shaun's embrace; "Can I see her? I-I want to see her… I don't want her to be mad that I forgot what she looks like."

Shaun was opening his mouth to shout for Lucy to get in here right away and help him. But before he could do much more than take a breath in preparation of the words and turn his head toward the doorway Desmond was leaning into his shoulder and there was a peculiar wetness growing in the crook of his neck.

He didn't make a sound. His breathing remained slow and even his expression untroubled, but his eyes ran nonstop for the next two hours. Two hours Shaun found himself unable to move, and so he sat there on that lumpy couch with Desmond's head pillowed on his lap brushing his fingers through the younger man's shaggy hair.

That night was similar, only instead of the silence Lucy and Rebecca would have been able to sleep through, Desmond wept, ceaselessly, uncontrollably. Unbearably harsh sobs stealing his breath before he even got it in properly.

Shaun held him through all of it.

Lucy and Rebecca peeked into the room a few times but didn't make to offer their arms or shoulders. It was unfair, evil of them Shaun decided. To just sit back and watch Desmond's misery without trying to ease it. Though, he supposed, he was one to talk. When this had all started he'd kept his mouth shut as well, when Desmond had begun waking up every so often with a shriek, waving his arms threateningly through the air at ghosts he'd looked the other way.

And when those few instances turned into nightly howling while Desmond slept? He hated to admit it, but he'd ignored that as well. Plugged his ears and hidden his head under a pillow, refusing to allow himself to get attached… But he'd gotten attached anyway.

Desmond had an inhuman way of wriggling under his skin and making a home for himself.

And now, Shaun realized, he was probably the guy's only form of true support. And it hurt that out of all of them, _he_ would be the most sympathetic.

When the morning came Lucy pushed her way into the room with a syringe and announced, without looking Shaun in the eye, and without looking at Desmond at all, that it was a sedative and that she needed Shaun to hold him still for a minute.

Desmond though, it seemed, had more strength in him than either of them had suspected, and when he caught Lucy from the corner of his eye with that needle, in one wide armed striking motion he'd slapped her hand away and sent the needle flying where it lodged in the wall like a throwing dart.

He spent the rest of the day huddled in the bathroom, wedged between the sink and the bathtub with his knees drawn to his chest. But Lucy didn't try again to sedate him…

Shaun sat on the closed toilet lid most of that morning with him, just so the younger man wasn't alone, but almost three days without sleep had taken their toll and Shaun had to leave the day after tomorrow, feeling as if he were abandoning the younger man. He dropped himself on the couch, where he could lift his head and see Desmond still sitting in the lavatory like a bag of so much dirty laundry and was instantly asleep.

He woke a little bit later to someone tapping his shoulder but didn't open his eyes enough to find out who it was, just lifted his head and sat up for a bit, propping his elbows on his knees and his jaw on his hands, trying to will himself back to sleep, and when that someone settled themselves on the couch beside him and pulled him toward a warm chest, he didn't argue, just laid over and dozed back off.

Hours passed, he knew they had, maybe even the whole day from how swollen and full his bladder felt. The inside of the safe house was dark and there was a steady heartbeat under his ear and warm breath puffing quietly across his brow.

He knew who it was simply because his head wasn't pillowed on a nice pair of squishy breasts and silently he wondered when Desmond had moved from his place in the bathroom, but then realized he didn't care, he didn't care because one of the other man's hands was petting carefully almost hesitantly over his hair and Desmond was speaking under his breath.

He seemed to be mid-conversation with himself.

"—because he's my friend, Ezio… He's the only one I've got and I'm not letting him go."

"You heard what they said." The only way Shaun could tell who was speaking was because of the accent. There was Desmond's almost bland Midwestern accent, a pull of his vowels, there was Ezio's that was strange because the tone of his voice was more prominent than any actual accent. And what was there had a bit of a French lilt to it for some reason. Shaun really didn't want to know truthfully, he thought Ezio was a bit of a git. And Altair's accent rolled a lot. It seemed to pull his voice down half an octave, a strange mixture of Middle Eastern and Olde English. Hearing those three different speech patterns coming from one man was something like off a bad comedy he supposed, but instead of just being a character, this was actually another person. "He is leaving." Ezio said, "He has already chosen a replacement. Why torture yourself like this when he will be gone in a few days."

"Because we might all be dead in a few days, Ezio… And I'm sick and tired of being alone."

"But you will be alone again in just—"

"Shut up… What do you care anyway, you don't even like him."

"I never said that, he has his uses."

Desmond gave a shudder, his left shoulder jerked fractionally toward his ear and he was quiet for a long time.

Shaun let out a sigh and shifted his ear against the younger man's chest, lifting an arm to drape over his waist.

"My mom's dead, Shaun…"

His eyes snapped open and he stared blankly outward without moving.

"My whole family is dead…" He swallowed. "They found the Farm because of the Animus, they went in and they killed everybody… Like a bunch of rats in a nest."

Shaun gripped him harder.

"I asked Lucy if I could call my mother and she… she just said it." His voice sounded strained; "Like she was talking about doing the laundry or something."

"Des—"

"You told me in the car the other day… You told me you believed in a higher power."

He was quiet, so Desmond took the silence as agreement.

"You said you believed in a higher power, but not the conventional idea of god… Explain that to me…"

Shaun took a deep breath and let it out in a whoosh; "Do you believe in anything?"

He was quiet for a moment, "I used to… I never really called it anything, but it's the kind of belief you have that you're immortal, that because you're aware of everything now there's no possible way everything you're feeling and thinking will just disappear when you die."

Shaun nodded; "You believe in a soul then."

"I used to… I… I kind of still do. Maybe, a little."

"Maybe a little?"

He shifted uncomfortably

"Right… well," Shaun cleared his throat and let his eyes fall closed, visualizing the words in his head before he spoke them; "I believe the truth of god—and I'm using that word because it's what is most familiar to humans—is much more simple than anybody believes. I—I believe that the creating force in the universe isn't some grand spectacular king sitting on a gilded throne, simply because it is too human an image and god is not human… I believe that this spark of a soul is the only thing that god intended to create. I believe that we're all growing flourishing parts of one great whole. But, for us to be independent from the creator, this spark, our souls, were placed into something purely biological. Something that is not holy, or divine, but simply a container for all that we are." He paused and wrinkled his brow and seemed to choose his words carefully; "I believe that this speck of a soul is what causes us to feel sadness, or fear or joy. I believe that it is the purest form of the most potent and powerful emotion known to us… I—I don't think god is a person with a body and a scowl… I think god is innocent and pure and beautiful like that feeling you get when you are calm and quiet and holding the one you love… Nothing sexual, but that—that warm feeling of belonging… That's what I believe god is. God is this feeling, this thread that ties us all together. I believe that god is this whole to which we all belong."

Desmond was very quiet, fingers still combing softly through Shaun's hair.

"It makes me sick thinking how people have warped god into some warrior, some murdering, damning emperor who hates and is jealous and rages… Those are human emotions, biological emotions. The spirit—the soul, has no need for them. They corrupt you quickly and completely… And if the Christian bible is correct, god wouldn't know these things, because he sent Jesus down to experience life as a man—meaning that god has no reckoning about what kind of toll the biological takes on your spirit. Which just proves to me that this flaming god king is a contradiction to end all contradictions. It just proves to me that this god everyone is so hung up on is actually just a biological entity and not actually god at all."

"So, what you're saying is that the biological doesn't matter?"

"Exactly… The biological is just chemicals and sensory input, it is needed for us to survive and experience life on this planet, nothing more. Think of it like a space suit, yes? Your soul needs this suit to survive these harsh conditions… Some suits are different than others, and some are too small, or the wrong shape, because the biological is flawed. The soul is something entirely different. I think, that if the Christians are correct, it wasn't the human body god created in his image, it was the soul. The body is just packaging… sometimes quite inappropriate packaging indeed."

Desmond snorted; "Or insufficient packaging in my case."

Shaun smiled tiredly and patted the younger man's chest. "This body, Desmond, is just the wrapper to your spiritual mars bar. Where it came from and how it came to be doesn't matter. What matters is that _you _are in it." After a moment he rolled his eyes; "As well as Altair and Ezio."

"Did you just call me a candy bar?"

Shaun rolled his eyes again; "I've walked right into this… Christ I need a piss."

"I think you did… I think you implied that my soul is the gooey nougat center."

"I'm nougat… you're caramel… You're far too drippy and sticky and fattening to be nougat."

And Desmond released a quiet little chuckle, but the sound of it made Shaun's heart flutter and the edges of his vision to twinkle with aquamarine starlight. That wasn't a forced, despondent half sob, that was laughter. Actual laughter. The first Shaun had heard from the younger man in weeks. Shaun felt himself smile and his brows crooked upward, letting his senses be inundated by the sound of it.

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Lucy made breakfast.

Actual, fattening drippy with grease and oils, fried eggs, bacon, hash and toast with proper jam and BUTTER.

!

Shaun was salivating, having to swallow frequently and wipe at the corners of his mouth with the pads of his fingers as he hovered over the blonde's shoulders with his plate ready. Eyes glazed and intent like a madman.

Desmond had roused himself enough to sit at the table and contemplate what was put before him. He even tried eating some of it without Ezio there at the forefront of his mind shoveling it in for him.

Lucy smiled tenderly and rubbed at his shoulders while he tried to eat, attempting to straighten his hair out by coming it all to the right with her thin fingers.

He didn't eat much but he had gotten some down and sipped at a glass of orange juice.

Nobody spoke about the previous day and night's events. Nobody said anything about Desmond's fluctuating mental state. They just seemed content that for the moment he was lucid.

The lucidity lasted long enough for Breakfast to pass on into a file labeled 'good memories', one that was much too thin in Shaun's opinion, but he welcomed it. Shaun, in fact was doing the dishes when it happened.

Lucy came in with a manila envelope and a sad smile on her face. "Okay, Shaun… Your passport, driver's license, ID and meds… Your replacement should arrive this evening."

Shaun snorted and tried to ignore her; "Why this evening? I don't want to meet him. I picked him out, isn't that enough? Played your little duck-duck-goose game and everything. I don't want to see him, I'm content thinking that while I'm gone you'll be struggling to do anything at all and when I come back it'll be to deity worthy praise and a proper cup of tea because you've missed me so much."

Lucy snorted; "He's coming tonight because there's a storm coming, and also… he's not coming alone."

Shaun's eyes widened and he turned to stare at her, soap dripping from his hands; "What?"

Lucy nibbled her lips and glanced down at Shaun's feet as she spoke, only looking up again once she'd finished; "I sent the order last night… They've gone in after the Blanks."

Shaun felt a cold shiver run up his spine and his mouth became very dry; "Right… two of us, twice the brains—well, not quite twice, you'll never find anyone as good as me."

Lucy smiled and was opening her mouth to say something when from behind them there was a loud BANG! And both turned with a start to find Desmond standing in the doorway, the flat of his hand disappearing into an unfortunately large dent in the plaster.

Desmond's eyes were dark and unsteady, his stance defensive, head lowered, and when he spoke it was barely discernible as words. His voice was slurred, and the longer he kept talking the more dramatic it became until there was nothing but angry babbling like an infant trying to speak and the hand he'd put into the plaster curled into a fist and struck again—and again and again.

Lucy dropped the envelope and moved forward, hands out, eyes wide and terrified because as bad as Desmond's bleeding episodes had been recently, it had never been like this.

And that's when Shaun noticed the line of red dripping steadily from Desmond's nose and that there seemed to be something wrong with the left side of his face and in that moment Shaun remembered standing in his grandmother's bedroom before church some twelve years before while she'd lectured him. She'd been wearing nothing but her stockings and a satin slip over her brazier and girdle and her hair had been perfectly curled and wound up into a delicate bun on her head, arms looking like spotted bits of fried egg, all wrinkly and sagging and covered in freckles even in her old age.

She'd turned and started shouting at him for ruining his Sunday suit and suddenly her words hadn't been words anymore, and the left side of her face had looked as if part of a latex special effects mask was peeling away, loose and unnatural. She'd continued prattling on for almost thirty seconds before she'd slumped forward weakly into her wardrobe and slid into a pile on top of her shoes.

Shaun remembered being utterly terrified and unable to breathe and only after he'd gone to her and tried to wake her had he had the presence of mind, as a fifteen-year-old to call for an ambulance.

In that moment Shaun was transported back to his grandmother's home, back to the age of fifteen and he was standing there watching the person he loved have a massive stroke.

Shaun felt the heart beating in his chest like a foreign body and the next thing he knew Desmond was on the floor and Lucy was supporting his head, his thin lean body rhythmically tightening as if trying to draw his heels to the back of his head.

Shaun couldn't move. His back scraped against the lip of the sink as he slid to sit in the floor, his legs no longer having the strength to hold him up, soap dripping up his arms as he held his hands by his ears, fingers curled in shock.

Christ… Oh, Christ.

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	8. Chapter 8

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**Chapter 8; March of the Leviathan**

Shaun glared at them dangerously and they scuttled back like frightened parakeets on a roost.

He'd somehow—he wasn't exactly sure how—managed to get himself between Desmond and Lucy and was sitting there in the kitchen floor, with the unconscious younger man in his lap, holding him as if his life depended on it.

Damn them. They'd ignored it all this time, they'd never once offered a hand, or a shoulder for Desmond's comfort. Never once stopped to give him a hug and tell him it was going to be alright, even if they knew it wasn't. Shaun had done it, Shaun had helped, had let himself become emotionally invested, let himself CARE damn it, and now when the truth of their negligence was shown to them they wanted to act as if they deserved to atone for it.

No. Bloody FUCKING NO!

The third time she was rejected Lucy walked over to her bag and fished out the secure satellite phone she used to talk to the others of the Order, and punched in a number only she knew.

Shaun heard her talking, but what she said didn't register until she had ended the call and turned to Rebecca, twisting her hair into a sharp knot on top of her head.

"Go cycle up the Animus."

Rebecca paled, swallowing past a sour taste in her mouth. "I don't have the system fully upgraded… I—I don't know if it'll work. I thought we'd have more time—"

"Well, we don't."

Rebecca squared her shoulders and pursed her lips, gave a nod and went to work.

Shaun's stomach bubbled unpleasantly, realizing that the Zero hour had finally arrived. Scared shitless when he realized what it meant. That either the Blanks would arrive and the separation would go as planned, or Desmond would be killed in the process.

"No—" He said, not even noticing that his voice cracked; "No, you'll hurt him!" He gripped Desmond tighter and an irrational fear flooded him like quicksilver. "I won't let you hurt him again!" And he meant it. He would fight with his very life to ensure Desmond wasn't hurt anymore by this madness.

He'd reached the end of the road and the end of his tolerance.

"Shaun," Lucy's voice was low, final. "It's not our choice anymore… He's losing it. If they're not separated immediately they'll all die… Look at him. Just LOOK at him."

And he did… and it hurt.

The Bleeding Effect is killing him, in more ways than one. And one way or another, their suffering had to end. It was the only humane thing to do. Try like hell to cure him… and if it came down to it in the end, put him out of his misery.

What cruelty…

Shaun pulled him closer still and buried his nose in his hair; "Hang in there… Please, God, just hang in there, Des. They're coming… It's over now, they're coming."

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Lucy and Rebecca worked feverishly, and Shaun just sat there on the big bed in the main room holding Desmond to his chest like a child, offering gentle strokes of his fingertips against his cheeks, or over damp dirty hair. He was awake, but didn't seem to be aware of anything, just staring sightlessly out at the ceiling.

Shaun found himself humming tonelessly and mumbling the words to old songs he remembered from his childhood. Hymns from a time he once believed in the Catholic god. There was a sad flicker in those dark eyes every so often or a slow shuddering breath, but otherwise he didn't seem to have the strength to react.

There were spare animus parts tossed to the ends of the room, stacked in front of the curtain covered window and even stacked on Baby itself.

Rebecca was squinting at the end of a soldering iron as she muscled together a second, and third main system bank, connecting them all through her computer by a complicated rainbow assortment of wires.

It wasn't pretty by any means, but if Rebecca was confident enough to practically gut her Baby it would work. Even if the whole thing was a failure, it wouldn't be because of the machine, because Rebecca Crane was a Technological Goddess and a programmer extraordinaire and she never did anything by halves.

Desmond whined and his eyes slid closed, words that weren't really words, but a mash of Italian, Arabic and English as all three of them tried to speak at once; _"I want my mother…"_

It was a pitiful, heartbreaking sound and Shaun bowed his head, all caution thrown to the wind and he brushed dark hair from a pale face and offered a few gentle, chaste kisses on brow and cheeks to calm him.

The move, he decided, had just been too much.

And then Lucy's phone rang…

She sat stone still for ten seconds and let it ring twice more before she launched herself to her feet and snatched it up, jerking the antenna into position and stabbing a finger into her unoccupied ear. "Hello? Yes—yes, HELLO!"

Shaun couldn't hear the voice on the other end, but from how pale, gray-green Lucy suddenly became he knew, deep in his heart of hearts that it was not good news.

"How bad is it… I-is the damage extensive? Okay, no—no we'll deal with it… You got them, that's all that matters… Are you still being followed?" A pause, listening. "Okay, good… We're almost ready… We'll be up and running by the time you get here." She swallowed past a lump in her throat and bowed her head; "She'd be proud of you, Zack… I know she would."

And Shaun's fingers stiffened like claws. He had never wanted to see that man again… And now here he was forced into it. Of all the fucking days.

Rebecca straightened and rubbed the small of her back, fitting the last bit of equipment into its place and following the leads on the optical and neural sensors to the bed, then traced them back and found the probes and their cuff like housings. God but this looked like some sick Frankenstein experiment! If she'd had more time she could have at least made it look less like something someone had put together in their garage and more like actual scientific equipment.

"Lucy?" She called softly, trying to speak quietly enough that Shaun wouldn't be able to hear her over his own humming.

Lucy leaned close.

"I managed to finish the algorithm, but—but it'll only work if they're all three there… If Desmond isn't responsive enough to get all three of them awake at once none of this will matter… If They aren't all aware at once the algorithm won't pick them up."

Lucy's face became grim and her mouth was opening to say something—anything—but there was a strained voice, strong despite how he looked.

"We're like bowls…"

Lucy and Rebecca turned as one and Shaun stopped humming to stare down in shock at the younger man in his arms. It was obvious from their expressions that they thought Desmond was delusional and merely talking out of his head, but he insisted, tongue giving a slow swipe to his lower lip, eyes cracking open. "We—we figured it out… How to all be here at once… We have to like—" His hands twitched up and he stacked his fists one on top of the other. "—Like bowls…"

Rebecca's eyes lit up almost as if someone was shining a spotlight out from within her head and instantly she was reexamining her cookie-cutter idea. She hadn't thought of that, of stacking them one on top of the other. She'd been thinking two dimensionally when, from the way Desmond was talking, it was more likely that the three of them were three dimensional, each of them stored in Desmond's psyche like eggs in a basket instead of circles on a sheet of paper.

"When the three of you are separated, I will express my gratitude in a very explicit and unconventional way… With lots of tongue," Rebecca leapt to her feet and dashed to her console and began entering data at lightning speed.

Desmond hummed noncommittally and went still in Shaun's arms again, breathing slowly, sunk back in his head with Altair and Ezio because staying at the forefront of his mind was too tiring. He—and he knew they did as well—felt as if they were sinking, deeper and deeper into the back closets of Desmond's mind. Swallowed up by the blackness, bumping against one another as they fought to stay afloat in the tide.

Twice now Altair had seemed to fade off completely, only to resurface with a quick stab of pain behind Desmond's eyes and a few moments of frantic movement, bouncing around in there like a bullet ricocheting off the walls at random.

It took Desmond and Ezio pressing close to him to calm him enough to stop his flailing, and Desmond was becoming more and more aware of how fragile and small they were drifting back in his head like this.

He was still aware of his body, but he felt oddly disconnected from it, and he could feel Shaun moving, carefully lifting him and carrying him over to the Animus, then tucking a blanket around him securely. The tickle of his beard as he pressed his lips to Desmond's brow and one more soft pass of a palm over his head.

"They're here…"

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Shaun shrugged into his coat and met Lucy at the door, watching with baited breath as a pair of headlights made their way up the drive toward the house. Every so often the lights disappeared in the trees, but they reappeared soon enough, closer, flickering through the snowfall.

It was a van, and as it backed toward the porch Shaun saw silver and black pockmarks down its side from bullet holes. His stomach ached as the engine shut off and the lights went out.

The driver's door popped open and a young man dressed in foul weather gear, a black wool coat, LL Bean boots and jeans, his head covered by a black and gray striped knit cap and his face hidden behind a dark red scarf. The only thing visible were his eyes, dark almost black, and thick dark lashes. He slipped and slid in the snow as he made his way to the back of the van and wrenched the door open, shoving a hand into his pocket and tugging on a pair of black gloves as he motioned Lucy and Shaun forward to help him move what looked like two large white caskets.

Shaun was appalled at first, until he saw that there were bullet holes in one of the boxes and a large amount of fluid had leaked out, leaving a steaming mess of thick slimy water and smears of what was undoubtedly blood.

Lucy hopped into the back of the van wielding a pry bar and with the newcomer's help was able to pry the lid of the damaged box up.

Shaun peered in, his stomach doing flipflops. There was a man in there… A much thinner, malnourished version of Desmond with pale pruned skin and hair long enough to brush his mid back. There was a bloody groove carved in his side where a bullet had passed into his… his container, and another in his left leg, passing clean through his outer thigh. The lack of fluid in the container to cushion him had caused him to be jostled unforgivably as the van had moved, and bits of sharp metal and plastic shattered when the bullets had passed through, had left numerous cuts on his torso and the side of his head.

There was a strange milky colored oxygen mask sealed around his mouth and nose and various tubes and wires leading to different points of his body—Shaun tried to ignore that in respectful modesty of who this blank would soon be.

Shaun was amazed though to realize that the scar on the side of Desmond's mouth was present on this man as well although there was no tattoo on his arm.

Lucy plunged her hand into the container, swiping aside thicker strings of what to Shaun looked like mucus, but his stomach wouldn't allow him to fully analyze it, and checked his pulse, pausing a moment to struggle with the mask over his face and peel it off.

A tense five seconds passed before the body moved, chest rising mechanically and falling, breath puffing out silvery in the cold air.

Relieved when it was plainly evident in spite of his injuries that this one was alive, Lucy turned to the second container, finding a single bullet hole high on its side. A few moments of prying later and Shaun had the supreme horror of seeing what the inside of those containers was supposed to look like.

The fluid in it was disgustingly thick and clung to everything like a three-year-old's drippy nose. It smelled salty and sour and Lucy plunged her arms in again, to the elbow and searched the rim until she'd located a switch of some kind and with a pop, a three inch round hole in the foot of the container opened and the fluid began quickly draining out.

This one was mostly uninjured a few bruises and a scratch or two from the sharp bits of metal and plastic broken off by the passing of the bullet and looked identical to the first blank and Desmond as well. Lucy let out a breath of relief and nodded to Shaun. "Okay," She said and there was a deadly seriousness in her expression.

Shaun gave a nod and tried not to look at the young man in the black wool coat as he helped Lucy pull first one container, and then the other onto the snowy porch.

It took all three of them to heft one container inside, and by the time they'd come back with the second Rebecca had disconnected all the wires and tubes and was waiting patiently, a pile of towels and sheets and blankets at the ready.

They were too light, and Shaun was startled by the lack of muscle mass on them, but didn't complain as each one was lifted out of their container and settled on the bed.

Shaun and Zack sat to work immediately scrubbing the slime and mucus away from the injured body, who Rebecca had dubbed Number One for convenience.

Lucy moved around them like a fly, connecting the ocular or neural sensors where they belonged and sliding the needle like probe into a vein.

Rebecca's computer gave a soft little beep when each of them were connected correctly and she looked up at Lucy with a determined, but frightened look on her face. "Okay, boss… We're all go here."

Lucy took a deep breath and moved to Desmond's side, rubbing his hand and calling his name softly to get his attention.

He blinked dazedly up at her and seemed to work it out on his own without having to be told. He nodded, gripped her hand and sank back into his head a little.

Altair and Ezio were waiting.

This was it…

When he resurfaced Desmond was aware of Altair and Ezio pressed intimately close to everything that made him who he was. Even awake he could feel the warm, feathery edges of themselves brushing together, and the pure emotional sensation of it was almost overwhelming.

Lucy smiled down at him and rubbed a bit of moisture from the edge of his eye; "Okay, we need you as still as possible. Don't try to speak, don't try to move unless it's an emergency. You need to use as little energy as you can," Lucy smiled one last time and stepped away, taking up her place by her own monitor. She had her eyes on his stats one second, flicking to the images on the screen the next, then back to his stats so quickly it was almost as if she were speed reading.

This was something very delicate, something dangerous and she was not going into it until everything was absolutely perfectly aligned. All his stats had to be even, his breathing slow, his heart rate perfectly at rest, his pulse a slow gentle thumping. Everything had to be perfect or else they risked breaking it. Like an impossibly thin leaf of rice paper cut into an intricate shape, the slightest harsh touch would tear it.

They breathed as one, doing just as Lucy had told them what seemed like years ago and focusing on themselves, focusing on their memories, the very things that made them who they were.

Desmond felt everything about himself. Could feel the very edges of everything that made him who he was and it terrified him how small he felt. Frayed. Could feel the thin, ghost like fringe of his being tickling along the edges of his two uninvited guests. Curling and overlapping and smoothing once again. And terrifyingly enough, the more he focused on it, the less he focused on himself, the less smoothly their edges moved against one another. The more frequently the tiny spindly threads of his being began tangling and meshing with those of Altair and Ezio. He began to feel himself like a bubble, pressing against another bubble, slowly, but undeniably melding.

The Animus hummed beneath him and he sucked in a sharp breath. It was painful. Hot like a stovetop, but cold like acid, and it raced along every nerve, every fiber of his being.

He hated it. Hated that the three of them were forced to this, and through the threads that were beginning to tangle and mesh, he could feel Altair and Ezio's disgust as well. How afraid they both were that this meshing was irreversible. That if it went too far they would never again be themselves, but some twisted mash of nobody. Some anti-person.

Ezio was twisting now, pulling, trying to disentangle himself from Altair, but the more he struggled, like the tentacles of a jellyfish, the more tightly they clung together.

Lucy's voice was stern, underlined heavily with fear, and it scared Desmond even more that she'd actually slipped and let them know how afraid she was.

"Calm down! You have to stay absolutely still!"

Desmond wanted to reach back and grab Ezio, wanted to trap and pin and restrain him. But he knew that would only make the struggling worse. Ezio was like an animal when he was afraid, the more contained he felt, the more deeply he panicked.

What was happening was horrifying, but allowing that fear to overcome you would spell death to all of them.

Altair, where Ezio was slowly melding with him, could feel, and see, and taste the horror himself. The loss of control, the hopelessness… He tried to stay still, tried to ignore it, ignore the other's presence in his soul but it was impossible. This was the basest, most pure violation he'd ever experienced, and everything he was screamed at him to fight it.

And outside the Animus Rebecca and Lucy were moving in a panic. Everything hinged on this. On everything going so perfectly— but it wasn't. Everything was going horrifically wrong. Desmond's heart rate and respiration were skyrocketing. His sync rate was dropping, his face was becoming more and more pale and his stats were falling like a rock dropping from the heavens.

"He's bleeding out!" Shaun said, his thoughts and worst fears voiced in his panic. He looked up, face grim and disbelieving, and locked eyes with the women across the room from him. "W-what do we do?"

And Lucy felt that cold dead weight in her stomach growing. Felt certainty like a cold knife at the base of her mind.

What could they do? Altair had been able to grab Ezio and Desmond and literally tear them apart the day they'd begun to bleed together. But now? Now all three of them were melding, there was nobody else in there to pull them apart.

There was absolutely nothing they could do—

The Animus was still whirring, the sound gaining volume and pitch, falling, gaining, falling again as it tried over and over and over and over to load the splintered minds into its systems. Tried to access what it had been created to access.

"Lucy! WHAT DO WE DO!" Shaun found his voice, his stubborn nature defying the two women to just sit there with their heads in their hands and watch Desmond be killed a second time. It was not right… Just not fucking right!

She looked at him sadly, mournfully, and was opening her mouth to speak. To apologize to him, because she'd been wrong. She'd told him it was alright to get to know them, that everything would work out right and he didn't have to worry about someone he cared about being killed again.

But, Rebecca took the choice from her.

"You hold on to your ass, that's what you do." And her hands moved on the keyboard. _Function 11 B_X_OMEGA…_

A simple, infinitely repeating algorithm, the perfect balance between the X and Y axis… It had come to her one night while she lay sleepless. So simple it seemed unreal, but when she'd plugged it in… it had worked. PI. A number that was infinite and small and endless.

FLIGHT.

The click of computer keys was final in the tense air around them. Setting into motion the centrifugal force that would either pull Ezio and Altair away from Desmond into their own bodies, or scatter their three helplessly tangled souls into oblivion.

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	9. Chapter 9

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**Chapter 9; PI**

For something so horrific and violent, it passed by without a single sound from Desmond, or the two lifeless bodies lying on the bed, crude wires and monitors pressed close, connecting the three of them to the main Animus.

Rebecca held her breath. Eyes locked on Desmond's body, where he was shuddering and shivering and twitching as his essence and those of Altair and Ezio were buffeted and possibly torn into nothing before her eyes.

She wasn't sure what had compelled her to start the program anyway. Even though Desmond's stats were falling, and everything was going to hell. She just knew that a fast blast into oblivion would be more merciful than what was happening to him. Because, if the three of them bled together, oblivion would be what there was anyway, a slow shredding of self as they were braided together into someone new… Someone who could be anyone, who knew all their secrets, and could hate them for it, it was too horrific for anyone to endure. And Rebecca had become attached to them, in their own ways, and the thoughts of everything they were being used against the world, their memories, experiences and emotions being twisted and warped and used as a weapon made her sick. She refused to allow it. She couldn't bear the thought of the suffering they would endure, so she'd done it… Either it would work, or it would end them… Either way, something had to be done. Just sitting there watching was unacceptable.

Lucy dropped heavily into her seat, looking pale and on the verge of collapse. A hand pressed tightly into her stomach, the other cupped over her mouth.

Shaun was the only one who remained on his feet. And Rebecca supposed that it was simply because he was too afraid to sit down and leave Number One. He had to stay on his feet, had to keep pressure on those wounds, had to try and staunch the blood flow.

At Shaun's side, Zack was still, staring with wide eyes, coat opened and his lips parted in shock. Praying he hadn't just witnessed the utter destruction of everything they'd fought, died and bled for.

Desmond's heartbeat was slowing… slowing. His breathing quieted, the twitching and shivering ceased…

The Animus whirred, quieted, whirred, quieted, whirred—And started to load.

Shaun's eyes widened, focus honing in on Desmond's prone form as all color drained from his face.

Lucy was on her feet, practically running to her own computer and pulling on her headset. She didn't blink, couldn't, as the blackness and scrolling numeric code lightened bit by bit.

This was it. The answer, the moment they had been waiting for and dreading.

Had it worked? Or would the man on the screen be the faceless, nameless soul eater that the Templars had wanted to create?

Rebecca's arms went into the air, knees banging the underside of her desk as she came to her feet with a wordless little squawk of triumph. Staring in awe and relief and jubilation at the three huddled figures in the loading screen.

Lucy's breath came out in a whoosh and she was instantly typing, lips moving almost silently; "It worked, holy shit it worked."

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His edges burned, ached… Felt torn and bloody and abused.

For a moment he was nobody. Nothing. His thoughts were fractured. Flashes of darkness and light, and smears of colors he couldn't name. Then, slowly, the stillness around him became increasingly more evident, and he began to realize himself. His mind felt clearer, less hectic and tumultuous. Less like a hurricane was tossing him about in a small wooden dinghy. But still he clung. Even as he knew clinging would kill him, would bleed him dry into his two hopelessly trapped ancestors. Even though they knew clinging to one another would make them more ineffably trapped, they still did it. Too afraid and hurt and outraged to stop themselves, because out there in the darkness was a lightless speck of infinity and it wanted to blast them apart into absolutely NOTHING.

Desmond had felt for a brief hellish moment as if he'd looked into the face of that grotesque God King Shaun had talked about and seen something ugly and dark and hungry… He felt it as surely as Altair and Ezio felt it, because they were so intimately meshed there was no longer any boundaries between them. They were ONE.

And then something had happened… Faces; Friend, LOVER, Loved One… And something had struck them apart like a lightning bolt. Searing and burning those fragile, frail ghost like threads of their edges closed. Forever separating them.

It had hurt. It had hurt so much pain was a pale and unfitting word. It had hurt because, in those few fleeting moments they had been ONE, there had been such comfort, such sympathy and love and warmth they knew they would never feel something as intense or wonderful ever again.

So, they clung. Edges taking shape in the darkness, becoming hands, and legs and bodies… And they gripped one another tightly, trying to sink back into that womb like cocoon where they had been together because the growing brightness was strange and they didn't know if it was hungry like the darkness. They didn't know what it wanted of them, so they hated it as ONE and hid their faces from the light.

_"Des?"_

They shrank away from IT.

_"Desmond? Desmond, can you hear me?"_

He didn't want to answer, didn't want to try and speak because he wasn't sure where he ended and the others began. Wasn't sure which hands were his, which feet, or which body was his… He felt like he was in the middle of a freefall, tumbling head over heels in every direction at once, hurtling at a godless speed toward the ground where he would be smashed into paste.

This was nothing like before. Nothing like when they had successfully loaded in and tried to play through Becca and Shaun's cityscape. He didn't feel taxed or smothered, didn't feel pulled apart at the seams like he had when Ezio and Altair had shot off in opposite directions on that computer generated street. He felt—felt separate from them now, Even as something else connected them. This separation, the longer he focused on it, the more he thought about it—The more natural it felt. The more REAL they felt.

Slowly, carefully, he lifted his head and blinked dazedly at the brightness.

At first, everything looked exactly the same and he was terrified that, once again, they'd failed. There were the same streaks and lines of barrier script. The same cryptic looking symbols and shapes, and the odd molecular diagram… But then, strangely, he realized what hadn't looked exactly right, and he felt his heart thud frantically in his chest.

Where before everything had been that ashy pale blue, if he shifted his head to the side, just a fraction, he could see something else. Something new, because now there were green lines, and gold lines running parallel to the blue ones, so close that they seemed to overlap. Everywhere there was a symbol, near it there were two more, often different symbols, in green and gold. And it was only after he'd puzzled for a while at the strange new colors in a world that had always seemed so monochrome, did he fully realize what it meant.

Instead of being loaded into the Animus as one mind with three people within it, this time they had been loaded in as three distinct, different people. Three different programs running simultaneously, all overlapping into one pale field. Like Shaun's bank of computer screens. All three connected to one 'machine', but perfectly independent.

At first he didn't speak, not even daring to hope that what he was seeing meant what he thought it meant. But, after a few minutes, the silence had eaten away at him and he felt his lips moving, felt words on his tongue; "Lucy?"

His voice sounded stronger than it had before. Less computerized and incomplete, almost human.

She sighed deeply, and he could hear the smile in her voice. _"Are you guys OK? How do you feel?"_

Desmond couldn't answer that. He couldn't answer because he didn't truthfully know if they were OK, didn't know how he felt only that everything hurt, that they were there, all together in the Animus and—

And he was pretty sure he'd had on clothes earlier… Where had they gone?

Shaun's voice sounded indistinct and muffled over Lucy's mouthpiece, they must have been sitting very close together for it to be picked up; _"Why the hell are they naked?"_

Rebecca plugged in and let her breath out in a whoosh, fingers clicking on keys as she took in all the data pumping into her systems at lightning speed. "It's all mental… The error will correct itself once they're settled… Right now they're not fully connected to their physical presences inside the Animus. Just give it a few minutes."

"They had clothes on last time… What the hell have you done to the damned thing? Watching graphic pornography again were you?"

"Shaun." Lucy scolded firmly.

"Yes, I was actually, but that wouldn't affect this." Rebecca said, her voice somehow detached as she was focused on her computer screen; "They had on clothes last time, but last time they hadn't just been broken down and reassembled elementally by a repeating algorithm, had they?"

"They're still very much naked, Rebecca. DO something about it—"

"For fuck sake, Shaun, it's just dick and ass. You have them yourself, grow up!"

Shaun didn't say anything else for a long while, so that was helpful at least.

"How long will it take for them to settle themselves?" Lucy was moving around, checking the pulse, respiration and temperature of each of the three bodies laid out at their mercy. "We really need to threat those wounds properly and we can't until whoever he is, is conscious."

Rebecca clicked and clacked on her keyboard and let her breath out in a low whistle; "It—It's already done. They're separated, look!"

Lucy went to the nearest monitor and peered at the display, fascinated by the different colors on what had always been a flat white and pale blue, "Wow… So, which one is which?" She turned back to the two on the bed, taking a moment to help Shaun and Zack.

"I don't know," Rebecca leaned back in her seat and rubbed her mouth as she thought. "I don't even know if Desmond stayed put in his body, or if they played Musical Catatonics."

"Jesus, don't even kid about that." Desmond whined, hiding his face in the nearest shoulder again, a little less embarrassed to recognize the feel of cloth under his cheek now, instead of bare skin. He swallowed thickly and gripped tighter when the hand around his wrist squeezed.

Lucy finally returned to her desk, now that Shaun and Zack were finishing up treating Number One's injuries. Cleaning the wounds on his side to make sure there was no debris left in them, wrapping gauze firmly over bleeding spots.

"Desmond? Can you three not huddle like that? I need to figure out whose script is whose."

"No."

"Des, I really need you to move apart—"

"Not happening."

"You're acting very childish—"

"I think, considering what just happened and all the shit you guys have put us through, that we're allowed to act childish for a little bit. So, politely go fuck yourselves, and leave us alone."

"Desmond—"

"We're sorry, the party you are looking for seems to be unavailable, please hang up and try again later."

Lucy harrumphed but didn't say anything else for a long while.

Desmond was sure he heard Shaun chuckle but ignored it in favor of tightening his grip on Altair and Ezio.

They were separated, the moment he opened his eyes and left the Animus Desmond would have his own body again. He would have his own skin and bones. He would be able to SLEEP goddamn it! And even though he relished in the thought of how wonderful it would be to go take a shit without two people watching through the backs of his eyes. He couldn't bring himself to let go of them now. Couldn't force himself to step back from them, show off his middle fingers and leave like he'd wanted to do before.

All he wanted to do now was hold on as long as possible because Altair and Ezio were no longer strangers who had lived in his head and wore his body like a suit, they were part of him, and he was part of them.

"Desmond? You alright?" Shaun plugged in, finishing his work of bandaging.

"No."

"What's wrong?"

Desmond decided to ignore the obvious and with a difficult swallow, forced himself to speak. "I—I can't l-let go." It frightened him a little to realize that he just physically could not force his fingers and arms and legs to relax where he was wound around and between Altair and Ezio. Frightened him yet more when he knew instinctually that they were all having the same problem.

"Why can't you let go?"

"B-because they're me… They're p-part of me."

And Shaun's breath came out in a sigh; "No, Des, no they 're not."

"What the fuck do you know—"

"I know pretty damned much actually… I know that the three of you are very different people now. No more sharing… The fact you're genetically identical just gives you the right to say you're triplets from this point forward. Everything is the same as it was before, only now none of you will be hurt because one doesn't want to deal with the other two… You can literally leave the room now instead of having to hide back in your mind. Isn't that wonderful? No more emptiness, no more darkness, no more fighting for control. You can go watch TV, or go outside for a walk instead of that hell."

Ezio had lifted his head a little and was blinking around at the brightness curiously. He didn't say anything but his expression spoke loudly enough. It said quite plainly that he'd liked what Shaun was saying. Liked the concept of being able to calmly leave the room when Altair and Desmond got on his nerves. Able to leave the room and go do what he wanted to do instead of having to choose between fighting for dominance and shutting the two of them away, or shutting himself away.

A few seconds later Altair turned his face to the air and peered out through slit lids. He didn't speak, but the loosening of his fingers on Desmond's arm was evidence enough that his interest had been piqued as well.

Shaun took a deep breath and spoke again, calmly, slowly; "I need you to pull apart a little, just a little. Long enough that we can figure out who is who, then we can start waking you up."

The little bit they did pull away from one another wasn't quite far enough for Shaun's liking, but he let that slide. They'd moved at least, that's what mattered. They'd moved… And the colored script moved with them. The blue moved to the other side of the green, and the gold shifted between the two, mirroring their current positions as they sat in a lopsided triangle, their shoulders together, still somewhat huddled like cold puppies.

"Okay, wonderful. Desmond's still the blue script, Ezio's the green and Altair's the gold."

Rebecca mumbled it to herself as her fingers started clicking on the keyboard again, but she didn't say anything else.

Lucy came back a few seconds later, she must have unplugged and left the room without their knowledge. "I'm back, guys… Feeling any better?"

Desmond shook his head, and Ezio scoffed loudly.

Lucy tried to ignore it; "We're going to try and wake you up. We'll do it one at a time so there's less confusion."

They didn't seem enthused.

"Right, I need you all to close your eyes and take a few deep breaths? Just a few more minutes and it'll all be over."

They leaned toward one another further when their eyes closed, as if unconsciously drawn together.

Lucy let out a sigh of sympathy looking at them. Rebecca had said earlier that their physical representations in the loading screen, without prompting from selected memories, were all mental. They looked how they saw themselves. All their subconscious desires and thoughts played out in their appearances. She supposed that's why, when they had been in it before, Ezio's clothes would sometimes change colors, or style and he seemed to age and regenerate spontaneously as their game had gone on. The clothes that had manifested on them now, Lucy thought, said more about their mental states, and who they were, than anything that would ever come out of their mouths after this point.

Altair wore only a loose long shirt and pants, his hood pulled low seeming to swallow up his head. Ezio didn't even have a shirt on, just a pair of paint stained loose pants Lucy would be willing to bet his subconscious had pulled from Leonardo's closet. Desmond's jacket had a strange look to it. Not quite as it used to be when he would be traipsing around in the loading screen. Now instead of plain modern white, it looked like a strange mix of Altair's surcoat, Ezio's tunic, and his own hoodie. It broke her heart a little to notice how their clothes were all such a strange mash of antique and modern. Just little things, a zipper in Ezio's pants, buttons on Altair's shirt, a pull string in his hood.

They had all bled a little. They didn't even have to speak to make that perfectly clear. They had lost a little bit of themselves that day, and it would take a long time to put it right… if it was even possible.

They all looked so completely spent sitting there together in the loading screen. Exhausted on every level humanly possible. And looking at them Lucy made a decision. They had waited long enough.

"Okay guys, now comes the difficult part… I need you to all focus on yourselves like you did earlier. Focus on your memories, can you do that?"

There was no answer or reply from them so she assumed that they were.

They breathed as one, doing just as Lucy had told them and focusing on themselves, focusing on their memories, the very things that made them who they were.

"I want you to think outward a little and focus on your breathing, not your breathing in the Animus, but your physical breathing. Go gently, just kind of feel it for a few minutes."

Desmond was familiar with it, just a little slip backward and you were aware of your body where it was lying still. Sometimes you could even hear the murmur of soft voices as the others spoke outside their headsets, or the click of keyboards… Or even Shaun eating something or the clink of his teacup against a saucer. He inhaled slowly, deeply, his chest rising—pausing for a moment—and deflating at equal intervals.

And the other two chests, those still wet and chilled from the snow and slimy fluid in the capsules they'd been contained in, wrapped in thick sheets with Shaun quickly and efficiently pressing the last few bandages in place over the wounds on Number One's side, watching with sweat on his brow and his lips compressed in apprehension as the girls waited to see if it had worked—those two thin, undernourished chests began to move with purpose as well. Hesitant, uneasy… awkwardly—And two flinched. Face twisting in discomfort.

Lucy's breath jerked in and she almost grabbed at the figure on the screen as he just simply… disappeared.

Ezio felt it happen, the hand alongside his left was suddenly gone, and unconsciously he groped for it, feeling chilled and nauseous. And when he couldn't find that hand, his eyes flew open and his spine snapped straight, eyes wide and panicked, staring down at the spot with his lips compressed in fear. His head shook and his hair practically stood on end, scooting away from the spot on his behind. A whining, growling, almost screaming sound coming from between his clenched teeth. Horrific images flashed in his mind of a suffocating blackness. Thoughts of everything he was just blinking out as if he never was. Fear of everything he'd ever felt and remembered and loved being completely obliterated… Like those few times when he'd done something, said something, and absolutely and completely forgotten it had happened. He didn't want his whole self to suffer that erasure and THIS—

Desmond's eyes snapped open when the shoulder he'd been leaning on was suddenly gone. Not just that, Altair himself was gone.

Desmond blinked and waved his hand curiously, stupidly, through the space where Altair had been, fear building in his middle. And the silence from the workroom terrified him. "Lucy? Beck? Hey—W-what's going on? What happened?" He came to his knees, sweeping his arms back and forth in great arcs searching, hoping to bump his knuckles against the other man, praying that he'd just slipped to the side, or was playing hide and seek or—or SOMETHING.

But there was no answer from outside the Animus. And Ezio was on his feet now, Hands tangled in his hair, head shaking back and forth in something akin to horror. His clothes had flickered and changed again, and he was standing there looking thin and rail like, his limbs displaying that awkward length of his teens, looking somehow lost and swallowed up by his father's clothes. Every so often he'd flicker again and the green script floating around alongside Desmond's would buzz and blink rapidly as it changed and spun, trying to sync with the memories Ezio's mind was calling up.

Desmond felt panic stab through his chest… This wasn't good, and those three words were the understatement of the millennia, because Ezio, in his fear and panic, was remembering the day of his father and brothers' execution. And the absolute last thing he ever needed to re-experience was that… But, the Animus was only doing what it was programmed to do. It wasn't the machine's fault.

Desmond launched himself to his feet and ran at Ezio, grabbed him by the hood and knocked their brows together. "Stop it! Don't think about it!"

But the green barrier script was already moving, intersecting and forming blinking, hazy lines and outlines of homes and businesses and ghostly people were starting to stroll about excitedly.

"Ezio, STOP IT! Look at me!" He pulled and thumped their heads together again. It should have been painful, but they weren't really physical people at the moment, so pain wasn't physical either.

Ezio flinched, his eyes wide and horrified and blank in his terror and he gripped at Desmond as well. He didn't know what was happening, the memories he had possession of where Desmond had done this, seemed thin and unreal, like a dream now, and all that mattered was—"No… no nono. I don't want to disappear. I don't w—"

Desmond nodded, knowing exactly the fear Ezio was experiencing, having felt it himself before, but he was too tired and hurt to be afraid now; "Calm down… It's OK. He probably just woke up. He didn't die…" He didn't want to think about the possibility that Altair really had just blipped out of existence. His mind wasn't capable of wrapping around that at the moment.

Ezio's head was shaking back and forth frantically now, and he was trying to back away, all the while the world around them kept fighting to come into view.

None of this was easy to accept. None of it made sense. Maybe if Ezio had had access to all his memories it would be different. Maybe then he wouldn't be so afraid of the concept of death, but as it was, his consciousness hadn't chosen to centralize itself on his last memories, but had chosen an awkward mash of memories centralized on one feeling, one emotion, and Ezio was confused, afraid and the idea that in a few seconds he may just completely cease to exist, as if he never had been in the first place, the idea that there was no afterlife, that there was NOTHING and he may soon be lost to it terrified him. The idea that all his memories, all his experiences, thoughts, feelings… his very self would just be gone forever filled him with such a deep sense of futility that nothing else mattered but trying to deny it and the certainty of oblivion it settled in his heart.

And then there was a rattling noise of Shaun's breath against a microphone; "Everything's OK here, Altair's out—Oh, fuck—BECCA HE'S TRYING TO SYNC!"

There was a flurry of noise from outside the animus and Becca's microphone screeched full of loud music for half a second before she shoved her headphones aside and spoke in the firm, commanding voice of someone who knew exactly what she was doing, and would chew you up and spit you out like so much tough spinach if you disagreed or tried to hinder her; "DES, _OUT!"_

And Desmond was at that moment struck by a sense of pure clarity.

He had once experienced Ezio's birth, painful and traumatizing and horrible as it was, but he realized that this trauma would be so quickly forgotten, while at the same time it would linger and make Ezio who he was…

It was fate that violence would beget violence, and he supposed that in some way it was an assassin's destiny to be born like this.

It hurt, shoving Ezio's hands away from himself and stepping backward, locking eyes with the other one last time. This would be the last time they saw one another like this. The last time they had the option to run around free of gravity and the laws of physics. But this would not be the last time he looked at Ezio and felt the other man's soul so intricately connected to and within his own.

Already there was a great sucking void where Altair's presence had lingered within him, but at the same time there was something else. A thread, an unbreakable, undeniable connection between himself and the other two, and this connection was more substantial, more important than being ONE with them would ever be.

Ezio seemed to feel it too, because although he was terrified, and the world around him was becoming more and more familiar, the shouts and jeers more real, he didn't move to grab at Desmond again. Didn't scratch and claw and insinuate himself over the other man like he had before. He just stood there pulling at the collar of his clothes as if they were choking him, and through the fear in his eyes there was something dark, and a little hopeful.

The next time they saw one another, they would be in their own separate bodies.

Desmond ground his teeth; "Just take a deep breath and hold it!" His eyes closed and he inhaled deeply through his mouth, a great whooshing sound—and he was gone.

Everything after that happened very quickly.

The world seemed to just explode on Ezio and he found himself standing on a street, staring up at a rough, ugly scaffolding and his father's face… Their eyes connected, just for a moment, and there was something so real in them. Something warm, and firm and proud—

Ezio stared, just stared for a moment, and before he could change his mind, before he could be overcome by the fear of the situation, he let his eyes fall closed, filled his lungs, and stepped forward—

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	10. Chapter 10

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**Chapter 10; Sleep and the Sleepless**

It felt like dying.

Vertigo overtook him, and for a moment, just a split second of a thing, he felt his heart stop—

_So, this is the EJECT button?_

—and start again like a punch to the chest.

Everything was bright and loud and cold. His eyes were watering and his vision glowed with blues so bright they were almost purple, trailing along behind the figures that hovered over him like the forks and tongues of a living flame.

It was beautiful.

Lucy was bent over his chest, pulling at the blankets covering him, chafing his shoulders roughly; "Breathe, Ezio… Take a few deep breaths for me—That's it, good." She smiled gently and brushed the wet hair from his brow. "How do you feel? Can you hear me?"

His lips moved again, but there was nothing but a dry rasping sound as her reply. She smiled at him anyway.

He didn't want to move, he was too cold, frozen to the bone and everything ached. Why was he so cold? He only wanted to be warm again.

"Ezio, we're going to move you now. You're hypothermic and going into shock. Don't try to fight, we're going to help you. Rebecca's got a shower going in the other room, she's going to clean you up and get some proper clothes on you. After that there's a nice big bed right over there with your name on it!"

His brows crooked up questioningly, tilting his eyes in their sockets looking for this… this bed with his name on it. He'd never heard of such a thing before, and it would be fantastic to see. Why the hell did he have to shower and dress though. That seemed a lot of effort before he was allowed to sleep. Why couldn't he just go to bed now? He'd slept nude before… It was quite pleasurable. The blankets would be so warm and clean…

Hands were pulling at him again, an arm sliding beneath his neck and shoulders, another behind his knees.

"Easy, Altair. L-look, I know it hurts, but you have to stop moving, you'll only start the bleeding again if you keep moving."

That voice was strange… but at the same time familiar… Who was that?

Ezio turned his head as he was lifted and saw a strange man in a white jacket standing over the other form on the bed with him. The man looked familiar, but the longer Ezio stared at him, the more he thought that this had to be that informant Lucy had talked about… The one who was bringing the Blanks so he and Altair could… could—And then it hit him and he lurched in Shaun's arms, causing the Brit to drop him unceremoniously back onto the bed. His hands shot out, grabbing with numb, half frozen fingers.

Desmond turned, and for the first time found himself staring into a face identical to his own. A face that was wide awake and alert unlike the half responsive one lying on the bed, practically hidden beneath bandaging and towels.

This face was very much alive, very much awake and although it was thinner than his own, more pale and wreathed in long, slimy wet black hair Desmond could almost see himself in it… Almost, but not quite because despite the fact everyone said they looked exactly the same he could tell them apart. That wasn't his face, that was Ezio's and Ezio had just realized that he was really in his own body. That he could SEE and FEEL and TOUCH the men who had been crushed into one increasingly sick body with him for almost half a year. The two men who he had been perfectly certain had just been blasted into oblivion moments before, were not, in fact blasted into oblivion, but were right there!

Desmond expected Ezio to slap him, to show him not to fuck with an Auditore as he'd promised… But he didn't.

Ezio grabbed Desmond's sleeve with as much strength as he could coax into his undernourished frail looking fingers, and just stared for a good thirty seconds, but by that time Lucy had rushed over and was trying to cover him up again, calling his name and pulling at his fingers attempting to untangle them so Shaun could pick him up and he could be quickly moved to the shower before he lost consciousness from the cold.

"Ezio," she was saying, her voice firm but at the same time weary; "Ezio, let him go, you have to get warmed up before you pass out."

He gave a shudder, lids sagging, and his fingers unfolded, arm dropping limply back to the bed. His energy spent he slumped backward into Shaun's arms and his eyes fluttered shut.

He wasn't aware of much after that. His senses faded back, awareness still sharp, but muffled by shock and his need for sleep. He couldn't think of anything for a few minutes, maybe longer, he wasn't really certain. His eyes opened to slits a few times, awareness coming in fits and starts. Being carried against Shaun's chest and eased, sheets and all, into the bathtub. Warm, almost hot water raining down on him while Rebecca sat there humming as she rubbed his arms with a soapy cloth, down his chest and body… Supporting his head in the crook of her elbow as she massaged something fruity smelling into his hair. How _good_ it felt…

Drifting back into the sensation only to come to himself as he was being dried off, thinking that she must think he was completely helpless, like a sick old man, unable to dry or dress himself. And then he was moving again, cradled in Shaun's arms, only for a few minutes he hadn't thought it was Shaun, he'd thought it was someone else—Who that someone was kept changing.

At first he thought it was Leonardo, those deceptively strong arms and hands so gentle as he was lifted and carried. How full of contradictions his friend was…

Second, perhaps it was his uncle. Smelling softly of wine and food and sweat on steel.

Then maybe one of his friends… Soft, sometimes loud laughter. Bright eyes and keen smiles. Witty jibes and pokes into his ribs.

But last… last he was positive it was his father, and he clung desperately even as Shaun tried to ease him into bed.

"'sall right," Shaun said sleepily and rubbed his knuckles. "Everything'll be OK, just rest now."

_Rest?_

He remembered thinking that, asking himself just what rest really was as he was eased onto his left side facing someone else… someone with a bandage wrapped around his head and a growing bruise on his face. Someone who cracked his eyes open and peered out in confusion at being disturbed so violently. Someone who wrinkled his nose up in a rather pathetic looking snarl and mumbled something indistinguishable in Arabic— And then Ezio felt a hand find his wrist on the pillow… A hand wrapped in gauze, thin like his own and there was warmth in those bones. Warmth and a need for comfort in a way those fingers gripped at him.

He shifted closer, close enough that his breath mingled with this person's and for a while there was only that sound, only that closeness and warmth and that feeling of nearness, of sameness… And everything else was forgotten, allowing him to dive head first into a deep dreamless sleep.

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Relief wasn't the only reason Shaun didn't leave the next day. Yes, it was half of it, after they'd got Desmond into bed and their two newest... additions, settled, Lucy had produced beer... and wine, and scotch and they'd had a grand ol' time laughing and crying their relief that it had worked... IT HAD WORKED! She called the Heads and told them the good news and for the first time in decades, the Assassin Order went to bed a little safer than it had been when it had woken up.

They were one step closer to ending it... Well, two if you wanted to count it that way.

The second reason that Shaun didn't leave the next day was because the storm blew in sooner than they expected and he found himself stuck in the house with HIM and a nasty hangover.

Shaun tried to ignore the man at first, instead he stayed in the bedroom he was sharing with Desmond and watched the younger man try to sleep and suffering in silence.

Shaun wondered if perhaps there shouldn't be an Olympic sport for sleeping. They would have three gold medalists in their midst if there was.

Altair and Ezio slept like the dead, waking only long enough each day to sit up—eyes glazed—and eat something, or voyage to and from the toilet, the rest of the time they were pressed close to one another on the bed soundly and deeply asleep.

Desmond though, didn't have it as easy. He woke often, almost every hour with a panicked expression on his face gripping his head. Shaun had caught him twice now digging his nails into his scalp and speaking in a high pitched voice—"I—I can't find them… Shaun—Shaun, help me! I-I can't feel them!"

After the sixth time of this Shaun had had enough and had lifted Desmond off his bed with a soft grunt of effort and carried him—protesting shrilly all the way—into the main room and deposited him on the bed between Altair and Ezio.

Desmond had cursed quietly because his abrupt arrival had disturbed their rest, and asked in a hiss just what the fuck Shaun thought he was doing, that this wasn't going to help anything, and now look, you woke them up!

Shaun pulled the blankets up over the three of them and stood there with his arms crossed, staring downward commandingly.

Desmond was just a head and a hand beneath his cheek, his brow pressed to Altair's left shoulder, Ezio spooning himself to Desmond's back with a grunt and a deep sigh of relief. Desmond scowled hatefully for all of three minutes when his rapid agitated blinking began to slow and gently his brows rose in surprise. He released a soft whispered; "Oh," and his body gently went slack as the tension bled out.

Shaun felt quite smug after that, because not only did Desmond sleep without interruption from that point forward, but the slight tension between Ezio and Altair's brows was erased.

Shaun decided he deserved a nap himself and shut the door to the bedroom and hid himself under the blankets for the rest of the day.

Olympic sleepers indeed.

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Two days later Shaun woke early—it could only relatively be called morning, sometime after midnight, to a commotion in the hallway.

"No—nonono! Go back to bed! You're alright."

Lucy was awake.

A male voice replied, rough and disused and slurred slightly by sleep… He wasn't speaking English.

Shaun though, understood what he was saying and with a groan climbed to his feet. He expected Desmond to be standing there having a bleed, he'd hoped that since the separation the bleeds would be a thing of the past, but as soon as he threw open the bedroom door and strode quickly to the blanket cloaked figure standing there in front of Lucy and Rebecca's bedroom door Shaun knew that this wasn't a bleed at all.

Altair, it seemed, had woken up and ventured to the bathroom—if the light on was any indication. This was a first. The wound in his leg was still bleeding, and Lucy had tried to keep him off of it, injecting him with a mild sedative so he didn't hurt himself.

The Sedative had worn off or Altair had become used to it and gotten up anyway, and although there was no blood on the leg of his sweatpants, Shaun could tell from his stance that the injury was paining him.

"What's the problem?" He approached quietly and whispered it, because Zack was still asleep, and so it seemed were Desmond and Ezio, who had rolled and were facing one another, arms wrapped around the other's shoulders, cheek to cheek. Shaun vowed to take a photo for blackmail.

Altair tottered on his feet a little, eyes bleary face puffy from sleep, he had the waistband of his sweats clenched in his left fist to keep them up. Without warning his right hand snaked forward and caught the waistband of Shaun's boxers… and tugged them out, eyes curious as he peered in.

Shaun went perfectly rigid staring into nothing with an expression of utter and complete humiliation on his face, cheeks as red as chilies.

Altair grumbled under his breath and let Shaun's underpants elastic snap back against his stomach. He lifted his eyes and said something, growled it indignantly, and his expression was almost insulted.

Shaun's cheeks turned purple.

Lucy's brows drew down and she blinked stupidly at them; "Shaun… W-what'd he say?" She clutched the lapels of her bathrobe tighter. "What's wrong?"

Shaun's eyes slowly turned to her and he gave his head a little shake.

Rebecca scratched the right cheek of her ass and yawned; "You're being a douche. You're the only one of us that's conscious—besides him—that speaks fluent Arabic. What'd he say!"

Shaun let out a trembling breath, eyes rolling up to the whites, and when he spoke his voice cracked like a preadolescent. "He… He wants to know why he isn't circumcised."

Lucy's lower lip trembled and her face went red as a brick.

Rebecca blinked, her cheeks gone pink but there was something devious in her face; "He isn't because Des and Ezio aren't… Hell, I didn't even know he was before and I make it my business to know such things."

"Because you are a fulltime pervert."

"Damned straight!"

Shaun's eyes rolled back again, he managed to convince Altair not to worry about it until he was feeling better, and got him back into bed with only minimal resistance, then ignored the evil giggling from Lucy and Rebecca's room and shut himself away in his own again and thumped his head onto the pillow angrily.

Rebecca and Lucy giggled all night.

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Shaun's departure was delayed a total of four days. And the morning of the fifth he woke to a stranger in his room.

He very nearly shot Zack as he woke, hand finding the gun he kept beneath his pillow, but the other man stopped him by holding up his hands and saying in that cool calm voice of his; "It's alright… The storm's stopped… Luce said to wake you up."

Shaun sighed in agitation and swung himself out of bed rubbing his face.

He didn't want to leave, but knew he had to. It wasn't just for his own safety, but the safety of everyone. He asked Lucy as he swung his duffle into the main room if he had time enough to say goodbye to Desmond, but one look at how the three of them were huddled on the bed so peacefully dreaming Shaun found he didn't have the heart to disturb them and instead took one long, last look at Desmond's sleeping face—regaining his color and health—nodded, and left.

He took the van Zack had arrived in, it would be his responsibility to dispose of it and the two empty containers, and as he watched the safe house disappear in the rear view mirror he felt a twinge of worry in his chest of what this trip would reveal. Would he be the same person when he came back? Or would all of this have been in vain?

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Desmond woke for the final time at almost noon three days after Shaun's departure, with an uncomfortably full bladder and a wet patch of Ezio's drool on the back of his shoulder. He was insufferably hot beneath that mound of blankets with Ezio and Altair pressed so close to him, and it took longer than he would have liked to wriggle free and plod toward the bathroom on legs that only fundamentally seemed capable of carrying his weight. He wondered as he stood there, relishing in the silence within his head and the freedom of being able to urinate without an audience, who had changed his clothes because he distinctly remembered Shaun putting him in that bed with Altair and Ezio and he'd been wearing a red shirt and sweats. Now he was wearing a black shirt and his boxer briefs, nothing more.

It was as he was re-familiarizing himself with the function of his legs, drying his still soapy hands on his t-shirt then scrubbing the sleep from his eyes, that Desmond realized there was someone in the kitchen… Multiple someones.

He paused and shook his head because—damn, that guy looked familiar. He stumbled back a few steps, arms hanging loose at his sides, as if his shoulders were dislocated, and pouted severely as he blinked at the people sitting at the table.

They looked back calmly.

"What the fuck…" Desmond squinted, shook his head and blinked again thinking maybe he was just dreaming, but rubbing his face with both hands and looking again with his chin tilted down and his eyes wide didn't dispel the vision.

Desmond just stared at him for the longest time, baffled. He still had most of Altair's memories, but they no longer felt like his own. More like a movie he'd watched, the same with Ezio's for that matter. But there was still something potently frightening about seeing that man sitting there, so very innocently drinking his coffee and scratching at the end of his nose.

He was wearing a pair of sweats he'd cut off into shorts, was barefoot, and the sleeveless white shirt he'd dawned clung to his body like a second skin.

Desmond was entranced by the pattern of tattoos across his arms and shoulders, and the black plugs in his earlobes.

His hair was longer, brushing his collar and had a stiff looked to it that made Desmond think he'd fallen to sleep with styling glue in it. The man waved and when he smiled dimples formed on his cheeks; "Good morning," There was a strange… Desmond wouldn't call it an accent, more of a tilt to his voice.

Lucy looked down at her coffee cup uncomfortably.

Desmond blinked again, his stomach rising into his throat and he tried to swallow it back down again, but his mouth was too dry.

Desmond looked at him sitting there so casually and he could only see Malik.

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_There is some artwork I've found that I've been given permission to mention that inspired some of this. If you go to my DA account (TheAllPowerfulOZ. deviantart dot com) I've put them in a folder named 'things that inspire me to write fic'. There are only a few in there right now, but there will be more. XD And THANK YOU TO THE ARTISTS WHO GAVE ME PERMISSION TO MENTION THEIR WORK! *loves*_

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	11. Chapter 11

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_Hey Guys! Sorry for the delay I kind of had a baby. =3= Everything's OK and I'm going to be posting more chapters as soon as we're out of the hospital, but thanks to Hubby Dearest, here's a new chapter for you now. He let me lay in bed with Baby and dictate to him. *loves him* Anywho, if any of you follow my Tumblr there's pictures there of Baby. XD_

_Love_

_OZ, Hubby, & Baby_

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**Chapter 11; Legends Never Die**

That strange feeling of not quite being awake was nibbling at the back of Desmond's mind again and he was reminded of movies. It was the same feeling he got looking at actors and actresses after he'd seen a really good film. He almost didn't believe that they were not the person he'd seen on the screen.

The man glanced at him from the corner of his eye and the edge of his mouth quirked up further; "What?"

That VOICE! Fuck it all! He even sounded like Malik, but without the accent, and not quite as deep, younger.

Desmond gave his head a shake and looked to Lucy who had an open file on the table before her and was staring at it. "Good to see you're finally awake, Desmond… Why don't you have a seat and some coffee, looks like you could use it, I know I could," She sighed weightily and rubbed her face then addressed Zack in a hushed breath; "This complicates things… Really REALLY complicates things…"

The man nodded and took another drink of his coffee turning his back on Desmond who was still kind of staring; "They gave up trying to retrieve him, beat me within an inch of my life and left me for dead… I was lucky some fishermen found me and took me to the hospital. I was comatose for almost a month."

Lucy nodded; "They didn't bother cloning you because they couldn't even load you into the Animus."

He nodded. "They didn't know about HIM until after—" He hesitated and nodded in a way that indicated Desmond, but he wasn't talking about the one standing there in the doorway looking gob smacked. "So there's that at least. We might have a chance."

"Does he know?" Lucy said, eyes wary as she glanced up at him through her fringe.

The man was quiet for a few moments, giving his mug a turn on the tabletop before he was forced to speak; "Yeah… He knows… Now at least, I didn't even know before any of this happened and it's my job. My family swore we were French."

Desmond swallowed; "W-what are you talking about? What am I supposed to know?"

"Nothing, Des…" Lucy gave her head a shake and motioned to the man; "This is Zackary Bower… As I'm pretty sure you can tell just by looking at him, he's—"

Desmond scoffed and shifted uncomfortably on his feet wrapping his arms around him in a chill; "Yeah, I can tell. It's freakin' me out."

Zack turned to look at him and grinned again, showing too many teeth; "I do basically the same thing your friend Shaun does… I'll be his replacement while he's away."

Desmond shook his head and turned away to look Lucy right in the eyes; "Where is Shaun going and why?"

"Shaun left three days ago."

Desmond's expressions cycled through worry, rage and sadness, then settled back on confusion. "Why didn't you wake me up!"

"Shaun said not to."

There was the hurt expression and it made Lucy's heart ache. She took a deep breath and motioned to the other empty seat at the table; "Maybe you should sit down, Desmond… This is where things get weird."

Desmond inched himself closer and perched the edge of his hip on the chair, trying to put as much distance between himself and Zack as he could without looking rude.

"Zack was kidnapped by Abstergo about six years ago, before they realized Altair and Ezio still had direct living descendants." Lucy folded her hands under her chin.

Desmond nodded nervously and found he couldn't quite tear his eyes away from the other man; "I didn't know Malik had kids other than—"

"Neither did he… If what we've been able to uncover is correct, sometime around twelve-twelve give or take a few years, he met a nameless woman and fathered twin girls… One was abducted when she was in her early teens and sold into slavery, the other married a Christian Scholar."

"How do you know all that?" Desmond wrinkled his nose at her untrustingly, but instead of explaining Lucy motioned to Zack and remained quiet.

"Mr. Miles, I'm very good at what I do. It took me years to find it out." Zack finished his coffee and stood, refilling his cup and returning to the table as if he owned the place.

Desmond already didn't like him… He looked pretentious, his carefully combed, fashionably untidy hair, his gauged ear piercings, the expensive digital watch on his left wrist and the tattoos on his biceps… Desmond clutched his sleeve tighter to his arm and tried not to feel as tacky as he thought Zack was. "Why couldn't they put you in the Animus?"

Zack sat his mug down and shoved his hair off his brow, exposing a long thin scar above his right eyebrow. "I've got a nine-millimeter slug lodged in my frontal lobe… Every time they tried—And they tried frequently—I'd go into seizures… But that's not why I'm here. I'm here to work as fill in for Shaun… And if everything turns out alright, possibly donate some blood to your cause."

"What?"

"To clone him, Desmond," Lucy said under her breath, eyes still on that file.

"Why?"

Other than bringing Malik back for Altair, Desmond didn't see a point.

And then Lucy pushed the folder forward and Desmond found himself looking down at old—OLD photographs of familiar handwriting. Familiar books worn and half eaten away by time. His eyes widened and he stared down in shock.

"That… That's Malik's journal."

Lucy began fiddling with her coffee cup, eyes locked on the tabletop, she let Desmond read what he could of it from the photos and was aware of his eyes widening with each passing page.

Malik spoke of Altair being killed in battle, of days before his departure Altair entrusting him with a relic. Something he called The Eye. A disk, similar to the seals, but this one was different, lifeless. And on it, carved into the strange metal, was a large lidless eye with a deep hole where something was missing. The iris of the eye, according to Malik's writing, seemed to have been plucked out. All around the eye's edges were carved deep grooves like a maze or a cog of some kind, and on the back side of it a loop, as if it were some kind of plug, Malik had said. Or a weight, although it weighed very little…

There was a sketch—quite skillful in Desmond's opinion, and it showed the intricacies of its design almost perfectly.

What bits of Altair still lingered in his mind smiled because the drawing was deliberately flawed on major levels. Size for one, thickness and a few other details that were vague in his mind and he couldn't quite put his finger on, all to throw off the enemy should they ever come upon this description. And Altair's few remaining memories supplied a different word to Desmond; not plug or plate, or handle or iron—because to Desmond that's what it looked like, a round antique clothes iron— and he felt a shiver go up his spine.

_KEY._

And a brief mental sensation of pressing it flat into a groove on a mighty door, the center of the eye GLOWING, pressing in and turning, levers and dials and cogs spinning quickly, the doors swinging open upon infinite brightness.

He swallowed and would have missed the most important bit of the description if Lucy hadn't tapped the photo with her index finger.

_"I have hidden it,"_ Desmond read it slowly, hearing Malik's voice in his head, _"And will take its location to my grave… Altair died to protect it, and so shall I."_

None of this pulled in Altair's memories, but the faint, dream like ones from Altair's eldest son, the few Desmond had been able to access… Those placed this all occurring barely two months before Malik's death.

Which meant Altair didn't know where this Eye was. Neither did Ezio or Desmond. It was literally lost to the sands of time.

"What does this thing do?" Desmond tapped the illustration.

Lucy swallowed and looked up; "Have you ever heard of something called The Rose of Sharron?"

Desmond's nose wrinkled; "Isn't that part of a Red Hot Chili Pepper's song?"

Zack grinned; "Oh, he's good… And no, it's not."

Lucy rolled her eyes and continued on unerringly; "The Rose of Sharron is The Rose—shocking, I know… But the legend goes that one day a boy, walking in the hills, came upon a beautiful flower, and upon plucking it up a vault beneath the mountain was revealed, filled with treasures beyond your wildest imaginings… The boy dropped the flower and raced toward the mountain only for a voice to stop him saying; 'Don't forget the best'… The boy, seeing that the mountain was closing again, returned and picked up the flower. The mountain reopened and the boy entered in, gathering the treasure to himself in awe. He carried as much as his arms could allow and in his greed, sat the flower down so he could carry more treasure. As he was leaving the vault the mountain cried again; 'Don't forget the best', but the boy—so blinded by his greed, ignored the voice and rushed out to lay his burden down so that he could go back and collect more… But as soon as he had laid down his find the mountain closed and said; 'Foolish, greedy child, it was the rose that was the best and therefore the key to the mountain.' And the legend says that at that point, as the vault closed and the boy realized his folly, the treasures he had collected burned to dust and ashes—"

Desmond's nose wrinkled and his mouth opened to say something but Lucy stopped him; "The truth of it is though, that the treasures didn't burn to dust and ashes…"

And something clicked; "The pieces of Eden…"

Lucy sighed and nodded slowly; "The boy—supposedly—gave the pieces to his family members and they garnered great knowledge and power from them and with these pieces, ruled over man like Gods, but the Boy didn't keep one for himself… His eyes had been burned by the beauty of the Rose and he could see the intent of his brothers and sisters growing darker and darker—"

Desmond's throat felt sore and he swallowed it down, "You've got to be shitting me…"

Lucy sighed. "That's the legend… And more than likely, it's the utter truth," she tapped the photos in the folder, and sure enough there in Malik's journal was a new page, Altair's writing—frantic like it had been when he spent so long under the apple's influence, only this time there was no madness to it, only a more elaborate version of the story Lucy had just told.

_So… That's it then. _

Desmond slowly lifted his head and regarded Lucy and Zack for a moment before his upper lip rolled back; "If you can't go into the Animus what good would cloning you do?" Desmond felt anger like a hot little flame growing in his chest. It was bad enough he, Altair and Ezio would have to put up with this guy who looked so much like Malik until Shaun came back—IF he came back. What good would having a clone of him around do if Malik himself couldn't be Resurfaced to take control of it? IT would just be endless, needless pain for Altair. Having to watch an empty shell with Malik's face wither up and die, slowly, right before his eyes.

Desmond didn't care if they ever found where Malik had hidden the stupid thing. It could rot to dust for all he cared. He would not put Altair through that hell again. Besides, if they didn't find it, neither would the Templars. "What good is finding this Eye? Malik may not even know if we bring him here. This could have happened ages after he got that girl pregnant. It could be useless!"

"Desmond, we need the Eye."

"WHY!"

"Because if we don't find it, the Templars will, and they already have the Rose," Zack tapped the hollow empty portion of the sketch Malik had made in his journal, "They have half of it already. If they find the other half they'll be able to open the vault and take what they want."

Desmond's face wrinkled up; "So, it's one of those 'we have to find it so they don't' kind of things? And they thought Altair would know where he hid it?" He scoffed; "All of this is because of THAT thing!" He pointed roughly to the drawing.

"They thought the map Altair saw through the apple would tell them where the Eye was. That if they saw how Altair accessed it they could get to it too and find it, or better yet SEE it for themselves and make a replica… If we can get the Eye and destroy it that vault will never open again, the pieces that remain outside of it are weak because of how long they've spent outside the vault… They have a kind of battery inside of them, and those batteries are running very low, the pieces will die and we'll never have to worry about it again—"

"Until someone steals the key from us and this all starts over again!" Desmond growled; "And if that shit-assed boy left the key in the vault how did it get out again?"

Zack looked down but didn't answer and Lucy sealed her lips as well.

"You don't know…" Desmond crossed his arms.

"That's why we need to find it, we need to find it and seal it in the vault where no one can ever get it out."

"Well, it's kind of obvious that's a waste of time because it was sealed in there once and it got out again!"

Zack rubbed his face tiredly; "There was more than one key, Desmond… More than one doorway into the vault. So far, there have only ever been two keys recognized. There's a possibility there are more, but right now there's only one, and the Templars are half way to having it… We NEED to stop that and seal it up. If another key comes around somewhere down the line, then we'll seal that one away too!"

Desmond rose to his feet, glaring down at Zack; "You can't even go in the animus, so what fucking good is cloning you going to do. All that will happen is you'll hurt Altair, and I won't LET YOU!"

It was quiet—perfectly quiet for all of five seconds, and then Zack looked up and there was something dangerous glowing in his eyes; "I can't go in…" Zack took another drink, sat his cup down and reclined in his seat, hands folded casually across his stomach. "But He can."

Desmond felt a cold little speck expanding in his chest and he spoke angrily, hatefully; "Who?"

"Zack, no," Lucy's tone was warning.

But Zack was still grinning; "He's bound to find out some time… Might as well be now."

"What are you talking about?" Desmond scowled; "Who can go in?"

Zack smiled wider, such an attractive expression… or at least it would have been if it hadn't been so full of malice and underhanded victory.

And Lucy sighed, her hand forced. She met Desmond's eyes evenly and spoke in that same emotionless factuality she had cultivated so well;

"Shaun can."

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	12. Chapter 12

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_Short chapter this time, sorry, but I haven't had much time to write taking care of the Baby. However, I AM going to put up a new Chapter of Fast Cars sometime near the end of the week, Thanks to Hubby I've got a surplus of chapters for it again, and you'll get regular updates for a while. *aplauds the hubster* _

_Also, does anybody have any suggestions of something they'd like to see in this fic? I know where I want it to go, but that's going to be down the timeline for them and I don't want to have large chunks of time missing or not mentioned... So, if you have a suggestion, feel free to leave a note here, or you can send me a PM. _

_OZ_

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**Chapter 12; Underestimated **

Desmond felt his heart leap into his throat but he couldn't make himself break the fight for dominance he was having, glaring at Zack; "Shaun isn't descended from Assassins."

"Nope!" Zack said brightly, "He's actually descended from Scot-Irish pagans that drove the Romans out of Ireland… But his heart is an entirely different matter."

Desmond's mind seemed to go off on a tangent and he remembered not so very long ago laying in that hotel bed staring at the scar on Shaun's chest and wondering where it had come from.

Zack twisted his head on his neck and his back popped almost musically, he sighed and turned his eyes to the grinning cat on his mug instead of the scowling man beside him, for the moment conceding dominance; "I had a twin sister, Evelyn… We were both shot execution style—" He prodded the scar on his brow. "I survived, she… she didn't." He swallowed, "But… She just so happened to be your friend Shaun's blood type."

Desmond's throat tightened and he turned wide eyes to Lucy who had her hands folded gently on the tabletop.

Lucy spoke quietly, using small words so her meaning wasn't misunderstood; "When 'Becca was trying to pull Shaun out of England eight years ago after the Templars caught wind of him, he—he was shot. The wound became terribly infected and he suffered congestive heart failure. It came to the point that he either had to have an emergency transplant or he would die… He was aware of Templar activity we had been effectively blind to for decades, had seen it firsthand. He had hard evidence that helped save hundreds—_thousands _of lives… We needed him. So when Zack and Evelyn were captured and Evelyn was killed, we did what we had to do to make sure we kept him."

Desmond stared at her in shock, fear making his blood feel cold in his veins. "You cut out his heart."

"We had to… We had no idea who Evelyn or Zack were at the time, or what they would mean. Their family had been with the Assassins for hundreds of years and nobody knew. The farthest Ancestor we were able to confirm for him was a French Journeyman in the seventeen hundreds. He was trampled to death by Templars on horseback retrieving one of the Apples. It passed to the Master of the French Brotherhood and fell into Templar hands not long afterward and was eventually taken by Napoleon.

Desmond swallowed past the nausea burning in his throat.

"So," Zack began, tapping his fingers on the tabletop; "Technically Shaun isn't related to Assassins," He propped his chin on his fist; "But considering how sensitive your friend made her… Her 'Baby' we're pretty sure it will be able to pick up the trace genetics from the heart. The anti-rejection medication he's on would theoretically make that possible—"

"Could this hurt Shaun?"

Lucy reached out and covered Desmond's hand with her own; "He's taking the same risk you did. With him though he has to be lightly sedated to make sync easier. The memories aren't coming from his genetics so it will be more difficult… It—it could make his immune system aware of the foreign DNA, just like you mirrored the symptoms of Ezio's illness before your Separation. If it's not done carefully—it could cause his body to start rejecting the heart."

Desmond's mouth flapped open to interject but Zack beat him to it. "The Cradles—How you were cloned— can be used for more than duplicating whole people. If something happens, and he starts displaying signs of Rejection, it'll only take three days and a five hour surgery—"

"What if it happens and he doesn't have three days?" Desmond felt the muscles in his face beginning to ache from staying cramped into a frown for so long.

"He'll have three days and if the worst happens—Well, you're cloned, it's that—"

Desmond palms banged on the tabletop so hard Zack's coffee mug bounced and some of the dark liquid splashed out. "Yeah I was. And I'm assuming you read what Lucy wrote about what you go through. It's worse than the Bleeds, worse than anything because you realize 'this isn't the body I was born with. I wasn't even born at all! I'm something that was created in a fucking lab by a bunch of psychopaths playing God! Not two people who were, hopefully, in love and wanted me in their lives!' You start wondering if maybe there really is a God and if you're considered human or not. You start asking yourself if you even have a soul, and what's waiting for you when you die. It messes with your head so completely you can't function! I would have killed myself again if it weren't for Shaun, and I will NOT let that happen to him!"

And Zack was grinning again, that toothy, unsettling grin but he didn't move, didn't stand up and get into Desmond's face like Malik would have done, because despite how he looked, and how he sounded, this man was not Malik. And although he was most definitely an Assassin, when Desmond's sight slipped, the man was glowing brightly in shades of crimson.

Desmond's lips rolled back from his teeth and he stormed from the room. He stomped and swung his arms violently as he made his way down the hall to the bedroom he and Shaun had shared before, where Lucy and Rebecca had moved them the day before and when he yanked the door open he didn't even complain that Altair and Ezio were sprawled all over the bed mussing his sheets, he slammed the door and stalked over, throwing himself across the mattress between them and buried his face in a pillow.

A few minutes later Ezio wiggled and pressed his back against Desmond's left side, grunting contentedly as he drifted back to sleep, but Altair shifted his face from under the blankets he'd cocooned himself in and let out a sigh, reaching out to tug on Desmond's right ear to get his attention;

"You're too emotional… Breathe." He demonstrated; "Nothing is worth becoming this upset over… It makes you reckless and recklessness will cost you more than your patience."

Desmond swallowed with much difficulty and rubbed his face on the pillow; "I wanted to hurt him… I—I wanted to kill him."

"Who?"

He swallowed; "The man in the kitchen."

Altair chuckled; "Shaun? You only have two emotions concerning him. Pick one already, this back and forth act is tiresome."

"No… Shaun's gone."

And that amused little curl of lips was gone; "Who is in the kitchen?"

And Desmond found he couldn't lie. Altair and Ezio had been a part of him too long, they knew how to tell if he was lying or not. He could no more lie to Altair than he could lie to himself.

"Malik's descendant…"

Altair's teeth popped his jaw tightened so quickly. "He…"

"You don't want to look… He—he's the wrong color."

"A-are you… Are you sure? Maybe you did it wrong?"

"He wants to put Shaun in the Animus, and if Shaun goes in he could die."

Altair was quiet for a long while. "Why would it possibly kill him?"

Desmond let his breath out in a whoosh and turned his face out of the pillow, eyes closed as he explained it all quietly.

Altair listened without saying a word. He didn't speak or so much as move or blink until Desmond was finished and had turned his face away so he didn't have to see the disappointment in Altair's eyes.

"They are going to try to… to find Malik? So they can locate The Eye."

He looked up at the ceiling and swallowed the burn in his throat; "Yeah… They think they need to find the damned thing and nobody knows where it is but him, and maybe not even him if it happened after he knocked up that girl…"

"But it could kill Shaun, and kill Him at the same time…"

"Yeah."

Altair was quiet for a while longer and when he spoke he pressed his palm between Desmond's shoulder blades and did so in only a breath; "I miss him very much… But I—I couldn't let Shaun risk himself because of me… Not when he means so much to you."

Desmond scoffed and tried to squirm from under Altair's hand; "Stop it."

"Stop what?"

"Stop with all the self-sacrificing bullshit, Altair… You want Malik back, end of story. You want him back and as much as you want to care, part of you doesn't give a shit who gets hurt in the process."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because it's true… B-because I'm just as willing to sacrifice Malik and all he knows to keep Shaun safe as you're willing to lose Shaun to get Malik here…"

Altair bowed his head against Desmond's shoulder and let his breath out in a whoosh; "You love him."

"I do not—" Shaun had left without even saying goodbye… No, he couldn't—

"Yes," Altair sighed tiredly; "You do."

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	13. Chapter 13

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**Chapter 13; Lost Souls**

Zack went out for supplies at the beginning of the week, and Desmond convinced Lucy it was high time he was allowed to go out and stretch his legs. So, he bundled himself up nicely, and helped Altair dress, careful of his leg that, although healing, was still tender and stiff and if it got too cold wouldn't hold his weight.

Ezio, dressed himself—much to Desmond's horror— and came bounding down the steps in three pairs of pants and a blanket tied around his shoulders—Desmond convinced him to trade the quilt in for a coat and tried not to laugh when Rebecca caught him on his way to the door, turned him around and with nimble lightning quick fingers twirled his long hair into a braid and tucked it under a snow cap.

Altair complained, Rebecca had braided his days earlier and before they left the safe house he made Desmond promise to cut it off as soon as their walk was over with. "I'm uncircumcised and I have long hair… I refuse to allow this to continue," He gripped Desmond's arm for support and they hobbled outside with Becca in the lead.

The walk turned into a snowball fight, and Desmond discovered a strange sixth sense concerning himself, Altair and Ezio. They seemed to just know what the other was doing, and often wordless grunts and barks of noise were enough to direct them. It strengthened and solidified that CONNECTED feeling they'd woken up with and Desmond, for the first time in his life felt that someone understood him.

He didn't even mind that they slept in what Lucy affectionately called a 'Puppy Pile' in the same bed. It was calming and he always woke feeling so much more rested when they were there… Screw what everybody else thought.

With Ezio's help Desmond heaped snow into a pile and made a fortification of sorts, and when Lucy stepped out onto the porch to see what was taking them so long Altair threw a wet handful of snow that flapped against the side of her coat and left her standing there with her mouth open in shock.

It was more than funny… It was absolutely hilarious, turning to the little misshaped wall Desmond and Ezio had made and seeing the three of them staring at her with identical lopsided grins on their faces. Ezio even stuck out his tongue and without even so much as turning to look Altair lunged over and rubbed a handful of loose powder into Ezio's mouth.

Desmond cackled and then the three of them were wrestling and Rebecca was running forward with a laughing battle cry, diving over the 'fort' wall and joining in, catching coat collars and shoving snow down into shirts, freezing warm skin. Screeching when someone shoved a hand up the back of her coat and deposited an iceball.

It was a giant childish wrestling match and Lucy found herself laughing aloud, bent forward with her hands on her knees before she stood, pointed emphatically to the sky, shouted; 'CHARGE!' and into the fray she went.

That evening as Zack was coming back, he was a little unnerved to pull into view of the house and see the clearing around it was filled with an army of snowmen and various half-constructed fortifications. The yard was muddy in a few places where there had been serious wear of feet through the snow, and other places where the snow had been scraped clean from the grass. The walls of the house were decorated with melting clumps of snow like bullet holes and when he climbed out of the truck, hefting the box of groceries with him he could hear laughter from inside.

He entered through the rear kitchen door, to minimize water on the living room carpet, sat the box of food down and shed his coat, boots and hat. He found Lucy, Rebecca, Ezio, Desmond and Altair sitting around the fire place bundled in blankets smiling and red cheeked from the cold. He wondered how long they'd been out there.

Rebecca was re-braiding Ezio's hair, this time fish tail style, he knew it was Ezio because Zack recognized the accent. Desmond had his knees drawn up, arms crossed on top smiling at something Lucy had said… And Zack found himself staring at Altair. He'd obviously just had his hair cut off, because he was sitting at Desmond's side with his head leaned against his hip, and his injured thigh across Lucy's lap. "This side is longer than the other," He said, pulling at the shortened strands above his ears, dragging them out like wings on either side of his head.

"Aw, shut up, it's perfectly even… Your head's just lopsided!" Desmond said laughingly and finally noticed Zack standing there in the doorway. His expression sobered and he gave Zack a warning glare. No, it said. You stay away from him…

But it was too late, Altair had felt the tension enter his body and had turned to look. He didn't flinch, didn't blink, but the smile that had been on his face a moment ago was suddenly gone and the room was silent.

Zack had never really liked being the center of attention. It made him nervous and when he was nervous he lashed out to push the attention away from himself.

"What the hell is that mess outside?"

"Zack," Lucy said, swallowing in surprise, "I—"

"This is supposed to be a safe-house… Inconspicuous. There are thirty snowmen out there—"

"Snow Assassins!" Ezio put in pointing at Zack emphatically.

Zack let his eyes close and he rubbed at his forehead.

"Calm down," Rebecca said, twisting a hair elastic around the end of Ezio's braid, "It's just a bit of fun. It's the first day the three of them have had the strength and energy to stay awake so long, they needed the exercise."

"And announcing to the world that someone's here who shouldn't be is fun?" Zack crossed his arms over his chest.

"Oh, shut up," Lucy said finally, easing herself from under Altair's legs and dusting off the seat of her sweats; "Nobody's going to care if there are snowmen in the yard, we're miles from the nearest town, the only one who'll see them before they melt is us and maybe Shaun if he comes back on schedule… Jesus," She shook her head at him disapprovingly and pushed past into the kitchen.

Desmond and Altair remained quiet and as soon as Zack turned away from them Desmond realized how badly Altair was shaking. He sighed and put a hand on Altair's chest for comfort.

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Life with Zack was not easy.

Desmond and Altair avoided him completely, Altair going so far as to not leave the bedroom unless Desmond had told him Zack wasn't around.

It wasn't that he was trying to be an ass or anything, it was more that he couldn't bear the thought of looking into Malik's face again and seeing someone else. He didn't want to see Malik outlined in the red of an enemy. And as much as he desired not to see or hear the man again, it didn't work out that way because Ezio liked to be obstinate, just to piss Altair off and had decided he was Zack's best friend.

Zack tolerated him simply because he had to. He knew the history, knew everything Altair and Ezio had done, but he still couldn't really believe that this chatty self-centered weirdo who had acquired an affinity for Rebecca's lacy Camisoles and tight pants with no underwear was THAT Ezio… No way. Not possible.

And the sullen, introverted EMO who spent most of his time hiding in his bedroom reading couldn't be The Great One… Hell-FUCKING-no.

It had to be the Bleeding. That's what it was, Desmond, this pansy little twerp, had bled into the two greatest Assassins to ever live and—and RUINED them. That was the only thing he could think of to explain why they were not who he'd believed them to be.

Even hacking into Rebecca's computer and watching her relays was no help. It couldn't be possible. History was not wrong!

And yet, there it was… In all its disgusting, sullen, lace festooned glory…

Zack needed a drink.

Hell, Zack need a lot of drinks.

It was even worse trying to give a progress report to the Clan Heads. How was he going to tell them that their saviors were an emo book worm and a fancy little Italian in women's clothing!

Zack wished so very hard that he hadn't accepted this mission. Bloodlines be damned, there was probably a really good reason this Milk guy—Malik, he told himself; MALIK, had abandoned Altair. The guy probably WANTED the bloodlines to be separate, that's why he'd sent this woman he knocked up away.

Zack didn't believe in coincidence, everything happened for a reason, even as it happened for no reason at all. So, he sat out to corner Altair and prove to himself that this wasn't really the man everyone believed him to be, because it wasn't the Assassin's history that was wrong. The Assassins were trying to preserve truth. It was the Templars that were warping everything, that had based their lives on fantasy and greed and control of the masses.

So he'd done the unthinkable.

Zack stood up from the kitchen table when he heard the door to the room Altair, Ezio and Desmond shared open and followed that hunched form in the white jacket and sweats to the bathroom.

When the door tried to shut between them he shoved it open and forced himself into the room, and came face to face with Altair.

It was hard to tell them apart when their hair was covered. The only way he'd managed it so far was that Ezio still had long hair and most usually sought him out and generally made a nuisance of himself. Desmond pretended he didn't exist, and Altair went out of his way to avoid contact.

And now here he was, standing there with his back pressed against the door and Altair was standing there, fingers still hooked in the waistband of his sweats as he'd been readying himself to use the toilet.

Altair's eyes were wide, and his face was very pale, his lips compressed into a thin line on his face.

He didn't look anything like Zack had pictured him… He looked, for lack of a better word, scared shitless.

"Okay," Zack swallowed the nervous feeling in his throat; "What's your problem?"

Altair's throat worked but he didn't blink, didn't otherwise move. He mumbled something in Arabic, but Zack couldn't understand him so he ignored it.

"Let's get one thing straight, yeah? I don't know what the deal is with you or why you're avoiding me like the plague, but I'm sick of it! It's counterproductive and nothing is going to change because you hide whenever I come into the room. I'm not leaving so you're just going to have to deal with it."

Altair swallowed again and when he spoke his voice shook like a tree branch in the wind. "You… you look just like him. Even more than his own son… Is—was he from your father's side?"

Zack scoffed; "I look like my mother, thank you very much! My father was a fucking asshole and he can rot in hell for all I care!"

Altair flinched and his eyes slid to the ground.

"Why do you care about him anyway? Ever once think that he may have left for a reason?"

And the eyes that lifted to his own weren't scared, weren't uneasy, weren't EMO or sad… They were angry, cold and deadly and Zack realized that not only had he said the wrong thing, but he'd put himself between Altair and the exit.

"Is that what your history says? That he left?"

Zack didn't nod, didn't really say anything, just stood there stupidly.

"He didn't abandon us… He was murdered." His voice shook a little but he steadied it quickly, so quickly had Zack not been looking for it he wouldn't have heard it at all.

"If you are going to spout your history at me at least make sure it is accurate first." His shoulders seemed to square, and he drew himself up to his full height. "Go away."

Zack felt crushed, some electric sensation in the air seemed to try and wedge itself into his chest and he felt driven back by it and groped behind him for the doorknob. He told himself he didn't flee Altair's presence, he just left the room so he didn't have to watch the other man take a piss, but in the back of his mind some little part of him was trembling because maybe History wasn't wrong, just… just incomplete, because that man. That man who had stared him down just now was every bit of what History had made him out to be and more.

And he was not pleased with Zack at all at the moment. Not at ALL.

He wiped sweat from his brow and shut himself in the bedroom he'd claimed for himself, deciding that it may be a futile gesture considering everything, but still feeling the need to lock the door behind him.

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Desmond woke to Altair rolling over and presenting his back where moments before Desmond had been contentedly dozing to Ezio's soft snores in the back of his neck and Altair's heart thrumming quietly under his ear.

He knew, when Shaun returned, that he would have to explain why it was he'd found himself sleeping in the same bed with two other men cuddled up like fucking kittens, but at the moment he didn't give a shit. There was something peaceful about it. He rested more deeply and completely when they were there than he did when they weren't, they'd tried it a few nights before. Ezio slept on the couch, Altair in the big bed and Desmond in the one that had been Shaun's… He'd woken at nearly two in the morning to use the toilet and found Ezio curled up in the floor outside the door. They hadn't tried again since.

Desmond imagined it all in his head like he had before their separation, those brief peaceful seconds when they had reached for one another in the black recesses of his mind. Only now there was no threat of their consciousnesses merging. It was just that comforting, warm loved feeling that he secretly wanted to bottle up and share with the world.

But when Altair had rolled over that feeling had changed and being the closest to him at the time, Desmond had woken up.

Altair's breathing was different. Almost labored, and his heart rate was climbing, the feeling of unrest traveling through them and making Ezio shift uncomfortably in his sleep.

Desmond was about to ask what the matter was when Altair levered himself up and slid silently out of the bed. He crept soundlessly across the room and out the door, the latch clicking faintly behind him.

Desmond waited long enough for Altair to have used the toilet, then waited five minutes more before he became worried.

Altair wasn't likely to have gone to find a snack, or to sit down and watch TV. In the two weeks they'd been awake, Altair preferred to read or to take walks around outside than to do much of anything else. And he would have said something if he'd been going for a walk. Even if it was just a grunt as he'd reached for some shoes, no… Something wasn't right.

Desmond climbed slowly to his feet, pausing when Ezio grunted and blinked up at him dazedly. His rest interrupted by the others' absence.

"It's OK, go back to sleep." Desmond whispered it and Ezio's eyes shut again, instantly asleep once more. Like he had an on off switch or something.

Desmond eased the bedroom door open and peered out, ears strained searching for any sound.

There was movement in the darkened hallway, off toward the bathroom, and he narrowed his eyes, feeling that small electric like tingle somewhere deep in his brain, like the burn of a tight muscle and the world dissolved into subtle smears of color amid the darkness.

What he saw scared him…

Altair was very dim, as if he were deeply asleep and a bright red form had him pressed tightly against the wall.

Desmond had to bite his tongue to keep himself quiet because now he could hear whispering. Faint barely there, but audible.

"I don't speak Arabic… Look, I know you speak English so just cut it out, alright?"

Zack had his hands on Altair's waist and he shifted closer, leaning their hips together; "I'm open minded, but I'm not gonna be able to understand you like this." He chuckled; "Look I'm sorry about what I said the other day and I'm glad you're not avoiding me now but next time just tell me you're horny, OK? Jumping on me when I'm coming out of the bathroom isn't cool."

It was an unspoken understanding between assassins, sex for procreation was a must. Their numbers were dwindling and any birth was a cause for celebration. Sex for stress relief or physical comfort wasn't at all uncommon. As long as protection was used it wasn't that unreasonable for complete strangers on the same mission, even if they were married to other people, to find pleasure on one another. Most assassins weren't particular to what gender their partners were, sex was sex, it all felt good so who cared?

Sex was as casual as a handshake to some… And it seemed Zack was one of them.

And it was then that Desmond realized why Altair's color was so very dim. He wasn't asleep, but he wasn't aware of what was happening either.

It had become less of a danger since they'd been separated, but bleeds were still a threat. Ezio had had one a few days before while they'd been outside taking a walk with Rebecca. It hadn't been severe and luckily Becca spoke Italian or they would have been in trouble… and it seemed at that moment that Altair was having one, either by his choice or not Desmond didn't know. But he could hear what the other man was saying, and it made his chest ache. Made him hyper aware of the fact that Zack didn't know Altair wasn't entirely in the present at the moment.

_"I thought about you all day… I miss your smile. My… my son thinks I've lost my mind. Hiding myself in this damned orb… I told him it was so I could see his mother, but I—I don't think he believes me. Maybe I have… lost my mind I mean. Maybe we all have. But I cannot help myself."_ He smiled, a devastatingly dead expression and his hands were fiddling with the collar of Zack's shirt; _"I will figure it out. I must keep looking, that is all. It's in here. I can feel it… But until then, if this is all I have, then so be it."_ His face crumbled and he bowed his head into Zack's chest with a breathless sob.

Desmond ground his teeth.

Zack seemed startled, even though he couldn't understand what Altair was saying, he understood crying when he heard it, and he lifted a hand to rub awkwardly at the back of the other man's neck. Not sure what else to do. He wasn't used to prospective bed partners bursting into tears on him.

Desmond saw it happen, Altair just—just lit up again and his head jerked upward, eyes wide, staring into Zack's face with an expression of shock, fear and…

"Malik?"

Zack didn't move in time, and the next second Altair's hands were tangled in his hair and he had smashed their mouths together.

Desmond had never seen someone's color change so quickly, Altair went from a rather static, unremarkable blue, to something bright and close to violet and Zack's flashed almost orange for a moment before his hands came up and—And Desmond expected the other man to punch, to shove Altair away and hurt him in his outrage… But Zack didn't. His color flickered dimming, and he let out a sigh as Altair broke the kiss and bowed their brows together, smiling and almost giggling to himself as his color dimmed again as well. Sinking back into another less traumatic bleed.

Desmond watched, feeling heartbroken and cruel because it was true… Altair was a little crazy, they all were. And how pure and brightly he'd shone when he'd been lucid, but startled enough by Zack's presence to think what he had, to believe that the other man was Malik…

Desmond felt cruel because looking at how happy the very thought had made Altair, made him realize that he felt the same way for Shaun… And he was more than willing to break Altair's heart and kill his hopes to make sure Shaun was safe.

Desmond shut the door and threw himself back over the bed, fitting himself against Ezio's front and hiding his face in the other's chest.

Ezio didn't like the unstable energy, so he wrapped both arms around Desmond and held him, murmuring that it was alright, fratello, just go to sleep. He snored loudly in Desmond's ear.

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Altair came back to bed almost two hours later. His hair was wet and he smelled heavily of soap. He sat there on the edge of the bed for a long while with his arms wrapped around himself shivering.

Desmond was wide awake again, unnerved by the lack of emotion rolling off Altair. He was usually always emitting something. A low buzz of just about everything, it helped him blend in with a crowd better. A complete lack of emotion drew your attention to keenly. It was like a black spot on an otherwise clean surface. Just like a shadow was never entirely black, a person was never entirely emotionless.

"Altair?"

He flinched and gave a hard shudder.

Desmond felt anger bubbling in his chest and he wondered, quite violently, exactly what had happened between Altair and Zack and if he had done the wrong thing by leaving them alone like that.

Altair was acting like he'd been hurt in some way.

What—what if Zack had…

Was that considered rape? Having sex with someone who was in the middle of a bleed?

_Oh, dear God, what did I let him do!_ Desmond sat up quickly and pulled at Altair's shoulder, panic bubbling in his middle when he just followed without protest and let himself be rolled under the blankets between Desmond and Ezio. Ezio who was now awake and glancing around for the cause of the commotion. His brows curled down in confusion at how chilled Altair was and he pressed himself close trying to share his body heat with the other man to ease his shivering.

Altair didn't say anything, just stared blankly up at the ceiling, moisture running steadily from both eyes and dripping into his wet hair.

Desmond didn't dare move, even after the chill had been chased out of Altair's body, he didn't move, just lay there holding him, a million horrible scenarios running through his head at a mile a minute.

What if Zack had? What if he had taken Altair to bed thinking everything was OK, when in all actuality it hadn't been? What if Altair had woken up in the middle of it and realized the man having sex with him wasn't Malik at all?

It made Desmond feel sick and violated himself and when he heard stirring in the rest of the house he jerked himself out of bed, pulling the blankets tightly around Altair's frame, knowing instinctually that Ezio was following him, he stormed down the hall, down the stairs and into the kitchen where Lucy was making coffee and Zack was sitting there in his sweatpants, feet in sheep skin moccasins and a knit jacket with reindeer and pine trees on it, flipping through the newspaper.

Desmond wanted to punch him. Wanted to knock him right out of the chair with his fists and stomp him half to death, then let Ezio finish him off.

Zack looked up at the sound of angry feet on the stairs and when he saw the two men stomping toward him all the color drained from his face.

Lucy had turned from the coffee and was watching, a confused expression on her face. "What's going on?"

Ezio shoved a rigid finger in Zack's direction; "This piece of shit mistreated Altair!"

Zack and Lucy's expressions mirrored one another; "What?"

Ezio's face reddened; "Violated his person!"

Lucy took a step back, eyes wide and horrified she turned to Zack with her mouth hanging open.

Zack's face was similarly outraged. "I did no such thing!" He cursed bitterly in French and came to his feet shouting and gesturing at the hallway.

Ezio shoved Desmond out of the way and pushed in close to Zack, bumping their chests together threateningly, using those scant four inches of height he had over the other man to his advantage to try and physically bully him into admitting his wrongs.

Zack though, was not so easily bullied, especially by a fancy little Italian man in pink sweats.

How or even IF they understood one another, speaking two different languages, was a mystery to Desmond. But he supposed Italian and French were just similar enough that the point was grasped, or they were too angry to care.

Ezio was accusing rape, and Zack was denying it.

Ezio pushed and Zack pushed back.

Desmond had to put himself physically between them to prevent blows from being dealt. One hand on each of their chests he took a deep breath and spoke more to the room itself than to either of them. "Alright! If you didn't hurt him, why did he come back practically in shock? We had to sit up with him all night to make sure he was OK."

"I didn't rape him, he came to me! I didn't do a damned thing wrong."

Desmond turned his head and gazed dangerously at Zack; "You fucked him… he was having a Bleed, and you fucked him anyway."

Those dark brows drew down incredulously; "I don't have to defend myself to you. I didn't do anything wrong."

"Zack, if he was having a Bleed and you—and you had sex with him, that isn't a good thing. You took advantage of him." Lucy had one hand braced on the counter and the other curled into a fist at her side. "He can't offer consent if he doesn't know what's happening around him."

Zack let his breath out in a whoosh and he scraped his hair back from his face, speaking quickly to the blonde in French. Too quick for Ezio to catch what he'd said.

Lucy's eyes widened and she went very tense for a minute, but nodded her head; "Go then—And don't you two lay a hand on him!" She glared at Desmond and Ezio with her eyes nothing but slits.

Zack left the room swiftly and a moment later, a hand to her head Lucy went out herself, she let herself into the room Altair, Ezio and Desmond shared and shut the door behind her.

Ezio snorted in his rage and plopped into a chair at the table. "Piece of shit… I'll rip off his testicles."

Desmond took the seat across from him and bowed his head to the tabletop. "It's my fault… I—I followed Altair last night and I saw them in the hallway and I… I left him there. I didn't say anything. It's my fault."

Ezio propped his jaw on his fist. "Yes, but I can't rip off _your _testicles…"

Desmond snorted and folded his arms around his head.

A few minutes later Lucy came back down and the morning progressed on as if nothing were amiss.

Desmond and Ezio though, stared daggers at Zack every time they saw him and plotted quietly on how to avenge Altair's virtue.

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	14. Chapter 14

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_To Von Who left the comment about brawling? Ezio has a lifetime of experience in his head, he knows how to get his point across without much fuss. *wink wink, nudge nudge*  
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_As for Desmond leaving Altair and Zack alone he's been with people conscious of the Bleeding for a while and simply took for granted that Zack would know as well, when he didn't. Zack wasn't ever in the Animus long enough that Bleeding was a risk for him and theoretical knowledge of what a Bleed is doesn't mean he would recognize one if he saw it. Also Desmond was kind of operating under the assumption that Zack was only red because he isn't necessarily a 'friend' and Desmond himself thinks of Zack as an enemy because he's "replaced" Shaun.  
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_Whether or not this is the real reason, still isn't certain *evil grin*  
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**Chapter 14; The Truth**

There were only so many things Ezio would tolerate from people. He could understand drinking, or visiting Courtesans, even—on occasion—imbibing in less than legal activities. Murder, mayhem and the like. But if there was one thing he would not tolerate it was such base and unconscionable violation of a person.

He'd beaten up a few of Claudia's suitors for doing the same thing, playing with her heart only to openly and vulgarly pursue another, or on one particular occasion, one who brazenly tried to take advantage of her.

He felt just as close to Altair now, as he did for Claudia—even though, he understood he would never see her again— he would never admit it, but that pulled at his heart like nothing else.

Ezio even so much as thought about Zack now and he wanted to pulverize the piece of shit.

So, it really was no surprise—to Desmond at least—when Ezio came to him later that afternoon with such a calm, cool expression on his face and whispered into his ear; "Let's walk."

Desmond was relieved Ezio didn't try to tie a blanket around his shoulders this time.

Ezio talked calmly, slowly, as they walked, pausing to push stick-arms back into place on a few of the Snow-Assassins, or replace little beady stone eyes or straighten mouths. He laid out a simple but… somehow brutal plan to Desmond and the whole time he could do nothing but nod in agreement.

Lucy had told them not to lay a hand on him… So they wouldn't, out of respect to her.

But that didn't mean they couldn't speak to him… privately.

They waited until Lucy had gone to bed and Rebecca was hunched hungrily over her computer screen—Desmond had the vague impression she was watching something that involved three men and a tube of KY but was just a little too freaked out by that idea to find out.

It wasn't hard to pick the lock to Zack's bedroom, or once they had, to slip in silently and lock it again.

Zack slept curled almost into the fetal position on his stomach and drooled messily on his pillow.

Desmond thought it was funny. Ezio held a finger up to his lips to silence his giggles.

It took barely half a second after Zack's eyes cracked open, his senses alerted to the tension in the room for him to roll quickly onto his back, arm out and reaching for his bedside table—Desmond was sure if he looked in the drawer he'd find a gun or a knife.

Desmond dove forward and grabbed Zack by the legs and Ezio was suddenly on top of him. Straddling his chest, crotch pressed close to Zack's face, a thin, deadly sharp kitchen knife held barely a centimeter from Zack's right eye.

Everything froze.

Ezio's head cocked carefully to the side, his expression so calm—almost serene. His free hand moved lightening quick, grabbing the sheet and stuffing it into Zack's mouth as he opened it to shout.

Zack stared up at him in outrage and Ezio lifted a finger and held it in front of his mouth, smiling pleasantly behind it. "My mother was violated," He sank his fingers deeply into Zack's hair, massaging gently at his scalp. "The night my father and brothers were taken from our home…"

Desmond ground his teeth. He'd always wondered, but part of him had been too afraid to think about it, it made him feel sick. He thought of Maria Auditore like his own mother and he supposed since Mrs. Miles' face was absent from his memory, Maria's wasn't too far off.

It was like a punch to the gut thinking of her being violated.

Zack's brows were low over his eyes, beads of sweat growing on his brow.

"My sister was hiding—mother had secured her in a secret room of our home to protect her… She heard everything… It took her fifteen years to tell me what had happened. There were three of them. They humiliated and brutalized her—" He paused long enough to clear his throat and swallow, the only indication that what he was saying hurt more than he was letting on, "—And when I found out who those men were, I—" He smiled, and there was something dark and gleeful in his eyes as he bent close, the tip of the knife unwavering; "—Would you like to know what I did to them?"

Zack didn't move.

"The first was simple, he was old, crippled, diseased… Dying," He moved the knife then, holding it close so Zack could see it, "I started with his right hand, each joint. Slowly, piece by piece… So he could watch. Then his left… Finger by finger. I did the same to his genitals… First the skin… inch by inch, striped it back… Have you ever seen a horse castrated? No? Neither have I, but I've heard it is much the same, just a simple cut, then pull them out, tie a bit of string around them, to cut off the blood flow, there is a bit of flesh connecting them, that is severed, then each vein burned closed—" He held up his hand and Desmond dropped Shaun's cigarette lighter into it. It took a moment, but Ezio lit it and the golden light of the flame danced wickedly across his face and the blade of the knife. "—Then another cut and they fall free… The second begged for mercy by this point… Confessed, plead god's forgiveness… Begged for death… The first died screaming like a mindless beast, his heart couldn't take it… The second bit through his own tongue as I started on his pene and choked to death on the blood… The third… yes, the third lasted longer… He died slowly… But he did not once beg for mercy—I wonder, Zack," He smiled and bit his lower lip, somehow playful and flirtatious even as he was sitting there, pinning Zack to the bed, holding a knife to his face, "I wonder, if you will beg, or if you'll die slowly, emasculated like the animal you are and not enrage me further by asking forgiveness you'll never deserve," He slid the blade of the knife through the flame a few times to sterilize it, or to simply heat it so it would hurt more, "Would you like to find out?"

Zack shook his head, rivulets of sweat running off his face, pupils blown wide as he watched the point of the blade seesaw back and forth through the flame.

"No?" Ezio turned and regarded Desmond with his brows up, grinning; "He says no."

Desmond snorted.

Ezio turned back and let the heated blade hover barely a millimeter from Zack's cheek—he could tell from the way the other man flinched and tried to draw away that it was hot and close enough to burn him, but really couldn't care less. "What would you do to stop me?" His lip went between his teeth again and his brows lifted; "Hmm? What would you do?"

The cigarette lighter went out and Ezio dropped it to the pillow by Zack's head and palmed himself roughly through his sweats. "What WOULD you do to stop me? Anything? Anything I told you?"

Zack swallowed reflexively around the quilt stuffed between his teeth and nodded.

"You would open your mouth… you would wouldn't you… You'd take me in. Take me in and do everything I told you. You'd take Desmond in too, wouldn't you… If I said. You would do anything at all to stay alive and keep your fingers and stones… Your precious pene… Yes, what is a man without his pene? How would that make you feel, eh? Not to have it? What if I did it anyway? What if you opened your mouth and pleasured me with your tongue—pleasured Desmond and I still did it? What would you do? Hmm? What would you do?"

Zack swallowed again but it seemed that was all he could do, just swallow repeatedly and stare up at Ezio with wide dilated eyes.

"Open your mouth, Zack… Open up—" Ezio was grinning as he carefully pulled the quilt from between the other man's teeth, the tip of the knife pressed into the reddened burn on his cheek; "Not a sound, Zack… Not a sound—"

"I didn't—" He stuttered, swallowed, gagged on his own spit and tried again; "I didn't touch him."

Ezio's fingers tangled in his hair and he pressed the knife tip in a little deeper, "What?"

Zack swallowed, eyes screwed shut, fingers tangled in his sheets. "I-I d-didn't—didn't touch him."

"Bullshit!" Desmond snarled and pressed his weight hard on Zack's thigh. "I saw you, you piece of shit! You knew and you did it anyway!"

"I didn't touch him!" His voice was only a whisper, but he'd strained it into a high pitch rasp, and before he even knew what he was doing, quickly, before Ezio or Desmond had enough time or sense of mind to gag him again he was talking; "IwantedtobuthekeptcallingmeM alikandIdidn'tdoit!"

Ezio shook him by his hair and leaned close; "What happened… Tell me or I start cutting!" The knife tip pressed in hard enough a bit of blood slid out and colored the blade.

And Zack caved like a house of cards.

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He had been in the bathroom, finished with the toilet and had cleaned his teeth, took out his contacts and had just opened the door to go back to his room for the night when he'd run face first into someone's chest—Instinctually he'd grabbed and pushed the person, pressing close, left hand tucked close, right across a thin chest, ready to fight, when he recognized the person's shape in the dark before him.

"Altair?" He sighed and leaned back rubbing his face; "What the hell..."

And then there was a hand on his chest, light—careful, just a touch and Zack had become very aware of the rasp of Altair's breath in his ear… Altair's right arm sliding around his shoulders and pulling him close.

There was such desperation in the pull of his arms, a need…

Zack let his breath out in a sigh and bowed his head against Altair's brow, relaxing, feeling the taller man's legs shifting, feet moving outward and giving Zack just enough room to step between them and press in closer.

"Oh…" Zack swallowed, nodded and swallowed again, "Okay, yeah…" He felt himself smiling. Was this really happening? Altair? THE Altair?

And then there was a timid, careful press of lips against the corner of his mouth. A soft whisper he couldn't understand.

"I don't speak Arabic… Look, I know you speak English so just cut it out, alright?"

Zack sighed and settled on his feet, aligning their hips. "I'm open minded, but I'm not gonna be able to understand you like this."

Altair lifted his right hand again, left still flat over his heart and stroked fingers through his hair, ruffling it in a way that would make it stand on end.

"Look, I'm sorry about what I said the other day and I'm glad you're not avoiding me now, but next time, just tell me you're horny, OK? Jumping me when I'm coming out of the bathroom isn't cool."

Altair nodded slightly and tilted his chin upward, exposing part of his neck, the hand on Zack's heart sliding up to pull carefully at the collar of his shirt. He spoke softly, every so often his lips twitching into a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes, then suddenly the smile trembled and his expression struggled to hold itself together. The next instant he'd tucked his head beneath Zack's chin and was outright crying.

Zack swallowed uncomfortably and offered comfort the only way he knew, drawing Altair closer.

Altair was still for a few minutes, leaning into the pressure of arms around him, but suddenly his head jerked up and he met Zack's eyes, steady and pleading and so… so relieved; "Malik?"

And before he could lean back and shake his head Altair had him pulled in and they were kissing—It wasn't a gentle kiss by any means, it was something hot and full of need and sorrow and Zack knew it well. Had had many like it in his life. It was that kiss of reaffirming your existence after you've nearly died. Quick and rough and brutal and it left your mouth bruised and your heart thumping.

Altair smiled again, tears still rolling down his face and shrunk against Zack's chest as if he wanted nothing more than to disappear there.

Zack though, heard a door shut behind him and turned his head, knowing immediately that someone had seen what was happening and his stomach lurched.

Altair was still smiling into his neck, whispering excitedly in Arabic and petting at him but Zack couldn't stand it anymore, even if he was already hard and ready for it—had secretly wondered what it would be like since he'd first started learning who Altair had been so very, very long ago—and he caught the other's hands and squeezed them, forcing their eyes to meet. "Altair… Stop it. Look at me and hear what I'm saying… You need to wake up." He gave his head a shake and tried again; "If you just wanted sex that'd be something different, but I'm not pretending to be a dead guy for you. No way. I've done some kinky things in my life, but I draw the line at that."

When Altair still didn't respond Zack did the only thing he could think of, he gripped him by the shoulders, fingers biting against tender flesh and gave the other man a rough shake. "Knock it off!"

And those gold eyes widened again, color draining from his face, hands curling defensively.

Zack felt relieved, but bared his teeth; "Don't do that again, alright? Fuck… just—just stay away from me, OK?"

Altair swallowed with some difficulty and gave a stiff nod.

Zack wrinkled his nose and stepped away with a shake of his head, leaving Altair standing there in the hall alone. He shut himself away in his room and locked the door, then stood there a moment with his hands braced against the wood and his head bowed, then let his breath out in a low hum. Shit… it would be better to forget anything had happened as opposed to eventually trying to resume what he had hoped would be a rather rewarding experience with one of the greatest assassins to ever live. He'd had his chance and he'd refused… Fuck… Goodbye bragging rights.

He collapsed on his face across the bed and tried to suffocate himself with the pillow, trying to ignore the sound of the shower from the bathroom.

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	15. Chapter 15

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_And a little backstory on Zack to clarify some things._

_Zack hasn't been back on active duty for very long, he suffered a traumatic brain injury (the gunshot wound as well as the beating that nearly killed him) and as anyone who has any experience with someone who has suffered a similar injury can tell you, it takes a long time to heal from one if a full recovery is even possible. Zack is seen by most everyone as a big liability because of that injury, but since he is who he is, he's needed. Zack himself though, tries to ignore this fact and put up a brave front and go on with life as normal to make people think he's OK, when in all actuality he's barely keeping up. He locks up under stress—which will be a big part of some big problems later— and becomes hyper defensive if he thinks someone is only offering him help because they 'pity' him. He's still capable of doing his job, but he's not nearly as good at it as he once was and it shows._

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**Chapter 15; Tide of Change**

Altair didn't talk for two days.

Ezio and Desmond stayed at his side the whole time, Zack had told them his version of what had happened and Desmond had been the one to whisper to Ezio carefully that maybe… maybe they should ask Altair what happened before they did anything too rash like, oh, I don't know, giving Zack a sex change without anesthesia.

They'd backed off with Ezio whispering a threat to him; "Stay away from my brother or you'll die bleeding from a hole between your legs," and they'd set out to make Altair talk… Which so far, had been a complete failure.

Ezio was actually the one to make Altair speak, of course Ezio just seemed perfectly able to make Altair do a lot of things, lose his temper was first on the list.

Ezio and Desmond were sitting on the edge of the bed—Desmond was teaching him how to play poker when Ezio asked, quite innocently what was wrong with his penis.

Desmond blanched; "W-what do you mean?"

Ezio shrugged on shoulder; "I have been awake now for a fortnight and not once has it so much as twitched… It must be broken. Is there a way to fix this?"

Altair—who had been curled beneath the blankets into a ball rolled his eyes.

Desmond swallowed but in that moment actually let his mind wonder back to the last time he'd woken up with morning wood… His cards fell from his hands; "Jesus…" He stood and quickly left the room.

Ezio sat there for a few seconds then turned and tried to catch Altair's eyes through the space between the blanket and pillow where he was breathing; "What about you? Does your pene function correctly?"

Altair growled threateningly.

Ezio laid down his cards and crawled up the bed peeling back the blankets to see Altair's face; "Let me see it, maybe—"

Altair threw the blankets off and lunged from the bed after Desmond, he barely limped now and he made it to Desmond's side just as he'd approached Lucy.

Altair growled it in Desmond's ear in Arabic so Lucy wouldn't understand; _"He's defective… He asked to see my pole. Keep him away from me."_

Desmond went very red in the face and couldn't speak for a few minutes. Well, at least Altair was talking again…

Ezio came over and propped his hands on his hips; "If yours works, perhaps it is merely in my head… Sicko plodge-icalle!"

Altair tried to put Desmond between himself and Ezio but Ezio was insistent; "Just let me see it! I won't even touch it!" He grabbed at the front of Altair's pants.

"You've seen your own!" Altair said defensively, dodging to the other side, gripping the waistband of his sweats to keep them from being pulled off lest Ezio actually manage to get hold of them, "Leave me be!"

Ezio grabbed at him again and Altair turned and darted toward the stairs. The upstairs half of the house wasn't really in use and Lucy had shut most of it off to preserve as much heat as possible from being leeched out through the un-insulated roof, but that didn't stop Ezio and Altair. Ezio cried out about the cold floor on his feet and Lucy heard a series of loud thuds and a door slam, then Ezio calling out loudly; "Oh, so you'll let HIM touch you, but not me? Your own flesh and blood?"

"Go touch yourself!" Altair said loudly; "He did not touch me and neither are you!"

"FINALLY!" Ezio cried exasperatedly; "Do you know what we almost did to him because we thought he'd hurt you? Dio Mio! I almost cut off his genitalia!"

"WHAT!" Lucy's eyes widened and her mouth dropped open.

Desmond smiled apologetically but didn't try to offer any form of explanation.

"I TOLD you two to leave him alone!"

"No, you said not to lay a hand on him… we didn't."

Lucy looked like she wanted to pummel him, "You threatened him! Why—What possessed you to THREATEN him like that!"

"We thought he hurt Altair! You expect us to just sit back and do NOTHING thinking he'd raped him! Not happening! He's lucky we didn't stab first and ask questions later!"

Lucy was shaking in barely controlled rage; "You two… you two are in so much trouble. If he called the clan heads—"

Desmond's mouth went dry. Clan heads? Zack was in communication with the clan heads?

"This operation is being monitored, Desmond… If they think Altair and Ezio are unstable—if they think YOU are unstable, they'll come in here and wipe you out, do you understand? They need you, but they can have your DNA if you're dead just as easily if you're standing there alive… The Templars cloned you, remember? If YOU are too big of a liability, they won't hesitate in starting over."

Desmond swallowed a lump in his throat. Isn't that exactly what the Templars had done? He thought the Assassins were supposed to be doing the right thing, but that was just it wasn't it, there was too much gray area on each side now… Where was that dividing line? Zack himself was proof of that. An assassin who showed enemy red.

Christ…

Desmond looked at the ground.

Lucy rubbed a line of tension from between her eyes; "I think you two owe Zack and apology… A BIG apology… And you'd better pray he hasn't called Them over it. Jesus…"

Desmond wrinkled his nose and looked away, he wasn't ready to apologize, he still didn't think he'd done anything wrong. Altair had been hurt by what had happened between himself and Zack, even if he wouldn't admit it. Even if nothing sexual did occur, something had and that something wasn't good. But would the clan heads see it that way? If Zack had called them, would they see it as protection… or an act of insanity.

Lucy let out a sigh and tried to change the subject, there was no sense in dwelling on it, it had happened and either Zack had called, or he hadn't, there was nothing they could do about it now. "What is Ezio trying to do to Altair?"

Desmond sealed his lips and shook his head, deciding it probably wasn't worth it to ask Lucy about his dick and the strange ideas floating through his head at the moment.

Unfortunately, at that moment, Rebecca came into the kitchen and Ezio gave a loud shout from above their heads;

"Alright, if you won't allow me to see, at least tell me if your manhood has reacted to stimulation! I-I truly feel paralyzed without it!"

Rebecca's back went ramrod straight and her face twisted into a gleeful—EVIL—smirk. "Oh, look at that, it's Sex-o-cock!" She rubbed her hands together and made for the stairs.

"Becca, BECCA NO!" Lucy ran after her. "They don't know!"

Desmond followed simply because his guts were twisting unpleasantly and Ezio was calling out plaintively now how he didn't understand why Altair didn't feel inadequate without his pene functioning fully.

"We don't know what?" Desmond caught up to them on the stairs. Rebecca had her arms crossed and her lower lip poked out miserably, like a child whose fun had been spoiled and Lucy sighed heavily, rolling her eyes.

"Nothing, Des," She pushed past him and headed back toward the kitchen, Becca stomping after her and raiding the jar of fiber bars Lucy kept on hand. She grumbled as she stalked away, gnawing on one unhappily.

"No, not nothing," He said, "Becca said it was 'sex-o-cock' and you said 'no, they don't know!' And THAT really isn't something we want to hear concerning sex… I mean, come on, they haven't changed it since we last had it… have they?"

Lucy smiled oh-so-sweetly and gave him a look that said he was so naïve, tapped his cheek and walked away.

Desmond stood there stupidly for a moment then turned and followed after her once more; "Wait, does this have something to do about my penis!"

She blushed but met his gaze and tried to fight down the grin; "Your penis is fine, Desmond… Just because you haven't consciously had an erection doesn't mean you're incapable… Ezio and Altair just… well, they've only been awake for two and a half weeks—" She lifted her voice and turned to call up the stairs in something close to a scream; "—Maybe if they SAT STILL long enough it would happen. I just hope they know when it does they're NOT GETTING ANY!"

There was a loud thud from upstairs and Ezio called back at her disappointedly.

Lucy sighed rubbing her brow. She'd thought dealing with Desmond alone was trying, now with the three of them awake and feeling alive she wondered if she would ever feel anything close to calm again. She turned and regarded Desmond quietly, then motioned to his mussed dirty hair and rumpled clothes; "You, on the other hand—"

Desmond blushed.

"—May want to clean up… Shaun's coming back tonight."

His face went bright red; "What? W-why does that mean I have to clean up?"

Rebecca reappeared from her bedroom an omnipotent look on her face a bright pink and lime green little box and a package of batteries in her hand, a robe with a towel laid over her other arm; "'cause you, my friend, are gonna get laid."

"I am not!" He snarled; "I'm not gay! I've slept with plenty of women!"

Rebecca burst out laughing and nearly dropped her 'supplies'; "Your memories may tell you you've slept with women but you," She paused in the doorway and smiled deviously at him; "Are a big ol' virgin. That body hasn't ever had sex before—and if what I heard you talking about is true, you've never even had an erection…" She shut herself in the bathroom, the lock clicking fatalistically.

Desmond went bright—fantastically, red.

Lucy was grinning, her cheeks pink; "And YOU may have HIS memories, but you are two totally different people, I promise you," She popped open the linen cupboard and began shifting through the extra bed sheets, blankets and towels so she could replace those on the fold out couch.

Desmond hesitated, brow wrinkling and he stepped in close to her his voice lowered uncomfortably; "What do you mean?"

Lucy hesitated, her expression distant, then she looked down at the sheets in her arms and smoothed some wrinkles from them; "HE was a bit of a playboy, Desmond… Confident, almost egotistical… I knew him, working with Abstergo, I took care of him just like I took care of you. There was one major difference though."

Desmond felt his brows twitch in annoyance because Lucy turned and pinched the end of his nose between forefinger and thumb, forcing his head to shake a little as she gave him a fond, but sad smile. "He and I were together… Aside from saying you would protect me, you've not once had a romantic thought about me… Shaun on the other hand…" She left the sentence unfinished and tilted her head to the side, her smile widening as she released the end of his nose and formed her hand to his cheek; "You may share common memories, but you are distinctly different people, Des… Remember that."

Altair and Ezio came back down the stairs then, Altair hiding under his hood, arms crossed—but a peculiar color in his cheeks, Ezio looking bored with his hands hung in the pockets of his sweats, his fingers discretely shifting back and forth as if doing a toddler like 'pants dance'.

Desmond wanted to roll his eyes and tell him to stop with the pocket pool but in that moment Lucy grabbed him by the chin and pulled him forward then pressed a quick chaste, sisterly kiss to his forehead, "Now, go on. I'm sure Ezio and Altair can stand to be without you for a few nights," and she left him standing there speechless.

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	16. Chapter 16

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**Chapter 16; Facing Facts**

Desmond took a shower. Not because it had anything to do with Shaun—shut up Lucy—but because he wanted to take a shower. And if he took longer than usual it wasn't because he was nervous about anything, nope. He just… just wanted to relax in the water for a while.

Desmond bowed his forehead against the wall and let his breath out in a huff. Shaun wasn't a bad guy, he could be funny when he wanted to be, he'd been borderline caring the past few months. When Desmond had felt so lost and afraid Shaun had been there to sympathize and make him feel alive again… Out of all of them Shaun had been the only one to offer any kind of comfort—

Shit—

It was hard trying to reconcile memories of attraction to women, of the memories of being with those women with his desire to be near Shaun—Maybe not sex… maybe—Jesus Christ was he really thinking about having sex with Shaun?

Shut up brain!

FUCK!

_No, no I'm not… I'll—I'll just tell him no. He won't like… like try to force me, he's not like that. I'm—I'm not attracted to Shaun. If he's attracted to me well, that… that's his problem. Okay, it's settled, no sex, everything's fine… _

Desmond climbed out of the shower, rubbing a towel over his head quickly and swabbing the water from his body, staring with a scowl at his crotch. His memories were false, he'd never had sex before… Holy fuck he'd never had an orgasm before.

_Jesus, stop thinking about it! It's not happening! FUCK!_

He dressed in as many layers as he could. Underwear, thermals, sweats, T-shirt, jacket, two pairs of socks. There, that would deter any sex crazed Brits, good. Everything was OK.

"Come on!"

"Ezio, I am going to suffocate you in your sleep!"

"You wouldn't… Come on, it will be so nice!"

Desmond froze in the doorway staring with wide eyes, lips pulled down into an exaggerated frown.

Altair was lying on the bed on his face, obviously trying to ease himself into sleep… And Ezio was on top of him… more than that, Ezio was blatantly dryhumping him, hands pressed into the pillow to either side of Altair's ribcage, knees cocked out, rubbing himself suggestively against Altair's backside.

"We are entirely identical, therefore it is not actually sex, yes?" He was grinning brightly and Desmond couldn't tell if he was serious or just trying to annoy the piss out of Altair. It was hard to tell especially when it was Ezio. He had a playful streak ten miles wide, but sex was a very serious topic for him therefore he could be entirely sincere.

"It's still incest," Desmond said with a wrinkle of his nose, stepping into the room, yanking his pillow from under Altair's head and hitting him with it, "Ezio, you look like a monkey riding a chihuahua!" He leapt onto the bed shoving the pillow over the back of Altair's head and forming himself to Ezio's back with a mischievous cackle. "Ye-HA!"

Altair, it seemed had reached his breaking point and thrashed wildly throwing the two of them off and rolling quickly like a sausage, winding himself up into a blanket cocoon, hoping that was enough to fend them off. His face was very red where they could see it from under his hood.

Ezio landed in the floor with a thud but was laughing even as he rubbed furiously at his elbow.

"I hate you both," Altair said in a growl. "You have no sense of propriety!"

Desmond peeled the quilt back and found his face; "Aw, come on, we're just trying to lighten you up a little. You're too serious, relax. He didn't mean it, right?" He narrowed his eyes at the other.

Ezio just grinned. "Have you seen him blush? It is very funny!"

"I try to relax and he mounts me!" Altair pointed emphatically over his shoulder at Ezio.

"Oh, you big baby!" Ezio flapped a hand at him, "I only do it because you blush like a virgin-" He laughed harder.

Altair wasn't impressed; "He should be gelded! Incest is a mortal sin!"

Ezio made a farting noise between his lips and picked at a bit of lint between his toes. "It is NOT incest… We came from the same person, therefore it is merely self-pleasure, a sin, but not a mortal one."

Desmond rolled his eyes hopelessly. "If jerking off is a sin we're all in trouble… Especially Becca."

Ezio lifted his head, his expression curious; "It is though… Isn't it?"

"It's not something you wanna do in public but no, it's just… something private…" He flushed; "Laws have changed a LOT since…" He made a rolling hand gesture toward Ezio; "You know… No one's gonna throw the book at you for pulling your pork."

"Who's pulling whose pork?" Rebecca stuck her head in the room and scowled at them.

"No one," Desmond rolled his eyes back into his head and let his breath out in a sigh, "We've just recently come to the realization our combined sexual experience is Nill."

Becca didn't even crack a grin; "You know, I could fix that for you."

Altair's eyes widened and Ezio leaned to the side to look at her.

"Virgins always break so pretty," Her eyes shined wickedly.

Altair blushed to the roots of his hair and shrank back into his quilt again while Ezio grinned so wide you could see all his teeth.

"Speaking of which," Rebecca schooled her features into something professional and unconcerned; "You two—" She pointed at Altair and Ezio, "Are on your own tonight, Desmond's got work to do," She winked.

Desmond flushed. "I do not!"

"Don't hold back, Des, there really isn't any point, the walls are paper thin and we'll hear you no matter what so just enjoy yourself," She elbowed him in the ribs; "I got twenty bucks against Luce that says you're a screamer."

Desmond felt as if he may simply burst like an overfilled balloon. Humiliation was such a pale word. "I am not having sex with Shaun!"

Becca smiled and cooed as if she thought he were just too precious and walked away.

"I'm not!" Desmond lunged toward the door and stuck his head out; "I AM NOT HAVING SEX WITH SHAUN!"

Zack peered out of his room and blinked warily at him, one brow cocked up questioningly. He hadn't really been out of his room much since THE INCIDENT but that didn't stop him from wrinkling his nose, looking the other up and down and offering his sarcastic opinion on the situation;

"Not with that attitude you're not!"

Desmond shoved the bedroom door open as if to lunge at Zack and the Canadian disappeared into his room again so quickly a painting on the wall shook on its nail as he slammed and locked his door.

Desmond grumbled and shut his own door, leaning his weight against it with his arms crossed.

Altair and Ezio were staring at him.

"What're you lookin at?"

Ezio waggled his pinkie finger at him and Altair spluttered, slapping a hand up over his mouth to hold it in.

Desmond snarled and yanked the door open again pointing toward the folding couch bed in the living room; "OUT! BOTH OF YOU GET OUT!"

Ezio snatched up his pillow and darted past dodging Desmond's fist as he swiped at him for making kissing faces.

Altair, still bundled in the quilt went past like a caterpillar on stilts dragging his own pillow behind him. Desmond thought he heard soft breathless noises from within the bundle but couldn't be sure.

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It was close to two in the morning and Desmond had been awake all night, his stomach boiling anxiously.

_He won't… We're not… I'm not having sex with him. I just—I just want to know what's up with him. If he's OK, why he left in the first place… I'm not worried or anything, I just… It doesn't mean I like him or anything, not LIKE like anyway… I'm… He's not TOO bad it's just… I'm not in love with him or anything, he's just…_

And a light caught his attention, slinking up the driveway, shimmering and silvery in the falling snow.

Desmond lunged to his feet and padded quietly but quickly out of the room, down the hall—hands out on each wall so he didn't bump into anything in the darkness, toes curled into the soles of his feet so they weren't broken if he bumped them on anything. He let his sight slip a little and could make out Altair and Ezio on the big fold out couch. Altair was sprawled to every corner of the bed and Ezio was flush to his side drooling contentedly on his shoulder. Neither of them seemed too terribly upset that Desmond wasn't there with them. Maybe they would be OK without him for a few nights—

_NO! NO, I am NOT having sex with him!_

It was a strange automobile, but there was no denying who was behind the wheel, Desmond could see his vague outline as he peeked out the window.

Shaun put the Land Rover in park and sat there for a few minutes with his arms crossed on the steering wheel, head bowed. He looked so tired.

Desmond stared at him, heart beating quickly in his chest.

Shaun's color was dim, dull… He was exhausted and when he climbed out of the driver's seat he wobbled a little on his feet, hefting a leather suitcase onto his shoulder as he locked then shot the car door. He paused in the yard and approached a few of the snow assassins, prodding this one, touching a spindly crooked stick arm of that one.

Desmond heard him chuckle dryly and had to bite his lip to keep from smiling. His chest felt warm, relaxed…

_I missed him… I-I do… Christ, I do like him. M-more than that… I-I think I kinda_—He twisted the lock and pulled the door open. He took three steps out onto the porch, the cold air biting into his exposed skin and snaking up through his socks into the soles of his feet.

Shaun looked up and they stared at one another for a few seconds.

Shaun hadn't shaved in more than a few days… he looked strange with so much hair on his face, rough and exhausted. There was something dull and hollow in his eyes that even though it was slight, seemed to swallow some of the amusement in his gaze like a hungry little mouth. "You look better… How are they?"

Desmond swallowed, trying to draw moisture back into his dry throat and when he spoke his voice cracked a little; "Good… good," He left it at that, they could hash out the details later. "You?"

Shaun shrugged one shoulder and turned back to the lumpy snow figures littering the yard. "I take it the three of you are responsible for this?"

"Yeah… It—It annoyed the fuck out of Zack, he kind of threw a fit. Said we were announcing our presence."

Shaun nodded; "You are… sort of… Is that one there stabbing the other in the neck?"

Desmond scratched nervously at his head; "Yeah, Ezio did that one."

Shaun shook his head, but he was smiling so Desmond didn't continue. They stood there looking at one another for a few moments in silence, just that distant crystalline sound of snow falling and icy stillness between them.

"Shaun?"

"Hmm?"

"Are you OK?"

He took a deep breath and looked around slowly, the sky, the snow, the assortment of icy guards then let his eyes linger a little too long—a little too intently—on Desmond; "Yeah, why wouldn't I be?"

"You're quiet… You're quiet and you haven't called me an idiot or anything and we've been standing here ten minutes."

Shaun rolled his eyes and looked at the ground, the corner of his mouth quirking up even as he spoke; "You're an idiot," He let his breath out in a long fluttering cloud and his boots crunched in the snow as he came up the steps.

Desmond thought for sure his heart could be seen beating through his shirt, like something warm and alive stuck under his clothes. Shaun passed close as he stepped into the house, so close Desmond could smell his cologne and the stale scents of dozens of people crushed together on a small airplane, as well as something older, sterile and acidic. His lips parted and he found himself on the precipice, just a hair's breadth away from saying something but his breath caught and he remained quiet as Shaun went into the house, holding the door open for him until they were standing just a few inches apart in the kitchen shivering slightly from the cold in their bones and the warmth of the house on their skin.

Shaun motioned to his own chin; "You shaved."

Desmond had to put his fingers to his face to comprehend what he was talking about; "Oh… yeah, I-uh—I cleaned up… a little."

Shaun hummed but didn't move. "How are things?"

Desmond's mouth flapped soundlessly for a second before he found his voice; "Uh—Good—" He swallowed, "Well, no, not good… Me and Ezio thought—"

"'Ezio and I.'"

"—WE thought Zack had… had done something to Altair and kinda-may-have threatened to cut off his balls and let him bleed to death—"

Shaun chuckled and the edge of his mouth curled up. Just a subtle tilt of his lips, dry but not chapped as he would have expected, he probably used lip balm… Something unflavored, natural, Shaun had a thing for natural stuff, bamboo and hemp, he probably smoked a lot of weed when he was younger. That's probably how he got so into conspiracies—you could see his teeth when he smiled, just a hint of them, that's how you could tell he was truly amused. Too much teeth between his lips and he was faking… Just a little, or none at all and it was real… this, this was real. A gentle, genuine curve of his mouth, crooked, impish, just a little sarcastic. Desmond had to swallow so he could continue speaking.

"—but it turns out he hadn't actually done anything to him physically and now he might have or might not have called the clan heads which would be bad because they could come and—and I-I'm gonna—"

Shaun's hair hadn't been washed, it felt just a little dirty between his fingers and his mouth tasted like old coffee and a little like rum and coke. His bag dropped right on Desmond's foot but he didn't care, couldn't care because he wasn't being punched or pushed away and they were moving, one hand fisted in his shirt, the other flailing behind them, finding the edge of the table and Desmond was suddenly horizontal and he was pretty sure he'd just put his elbow right in the loaf of bread Lucy left on the table.

The scruff on Shaun's face scratched—burned, against the side of his throat but it wasn't a priority, it was just quiet panted breath into his collar and warmth, strange tastes in his mouth.

Desmond supposed that if Jetlag had a taste it would be this and that was fine with him.

"Desmond," Two hands, cold and dry framing his face. Warm breath mingling with his own, soft kisses to his lips; "I can't…"

Desmond went still, hands still grasping where he'd been pulling Shaun's shirt from his slacks, eyes heavily lidded but intent, staring into those hovering over him… There was something wrong, something dull and empty.

"I can't do this," Shaun pushed himself up, fingers rubbing like ghost breath across Desmond's wrists, freeing his clothing and he stepped back, mouth compressed hands flexing rhythmically as if searching for something to grab on to. Something solid with which to ground himself, so he didn't go floating away into the stratosphere. He was quiet for a few heartbeats, just looking with his eyes that seemed so wrong; "I'm sorry…" He took up his bag, gaze on the floor, and disappeared quickly down the hall, shutting the bedroom door behind him.

Desmond stared, blinked, shook his head and stared some more, then somehow found the strength to sit up. His knees didn't seem capable of holding his weight and he sank to the floor staring at the wet footprints Shaun left on the tile, and the ambient blue glow of the night through the windows.

_Get up… getupgetupgetupgetup._ But he couldn't. What had just happened?

_What did I do wrong?_

_Why… What happened?_

_Getupgetupgetupgetup_

He pulled and forced his feet under him, standing there looking left and right, trying to find anything, any hint or clue that could tell him what had happened, what had changed, but there wasn't anything.

He moved slowly, on unsteady feet, down the hall and pushed open the bedroom door.

Shaun had the lamp on and was sitting on the edge of the bed in just his slacks and shirt, socked toes curled into the nap of the carpet, head in his hands. He looked up when the door opened and his breath escaped in a sigh. "Desmond—"

He let the door click shut behind him and approached slowly, warily, sitting on the bed beside him, very little space between them. He swallowed the tension in his throat and tried to speak in a whisper, it came out more as a rasp.

"They're gonna try to clone Zack…"

"I know."

"They want to bring Malik back, so they can find that… that stupid Eye or whatever it is."

Shaun nodded.

"They want to put you in the animus to bring him forward… But it—it could… it could kill you," He took a slow breath and looked at his hands, how he seemed incapable of stopping his fingers from twisting, part of him wanted to squeeze and pull and see what would break first, his pain threshold or his digits. "I don't want you to do it."

"Desmond—"

"They told me… about your heart."

Shaun's fingers tightened on his knees.

"Why did you leave? Does it have something to do with that?"

Shaun let out his breath and nodded; "Biopsy… Painful but necessary. They do it every so often to make sure I'm not… not rejecting."

Desmond nodded. "If you do it—if you go In, it could cause that to happen—"

"—Desmond—"

"—I don't want you to do it. We need Malik, but I need you more and I'm not letting them hurt you," He ground his teeth and breathed through flared nostrils a strange burn in his throat and sinuses, "What if you do it and it happens and they have to clone you too—I'm not exactly like HIM, what if—what if you come out and you're different? What if you don't love me I—I can't…"

"Desmond…"

He turned away and slapped angrily at his face pushing to his feet so he could pace and distract himself from the growing ache in his chest. "What if they bring Malik back and he doesn't want Altair anymore? W-what if he's different? Shaun—I can't—I can't do it. It's too much… They've taken too much and I won't give them anymore!" He felt arms around him, squeezing and he wanted to fight them, because he hadn't even heard Shaun stand up but he bit it back and forced himself to stay calm. Slow deep breaths filled with the scent of Shaun's cologne and old hospital antiseptic. "I can't lose you."

Shaun's beard scratched but Desmond welcomed it, bowed his face into the other man's neck and stubbornly wanted to go limp like a child in the store denied a toy, just so Shaun would be forced to hold him tighter but he couldn't, not when it would mean he had to move, not when it meant he may annoy Shaun enough to just let him hit the floor.

"You won't lose me… I promise."

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	17. Chapter 17

WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN OZ!

I have literally had the very life stolen from my veins by a despicable man who should not have been trusted.

Charlie, former Hubby and cheating scumbag left me and recently tried to take Steve away. He almost succeeded completely, but I've managed to retain my mommy rights.

All of my email accounts and social media accounts were changed and after many months of fighting I finally got my email address password back and thankfully, was able to get a reset for this and a few other accounts.

That being said, I am going to be transplanting all my fics to A03, I've found a home there, and hopefully, now that shit has calmed down a little, I can get back to work doing something that brings me joy.

So, there. That's where OZ has been.


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